Documentary Review: Leben und Überleben – Finding Joy in A Life Beyond Survival.

There is something deeply moving about watching a man speak about the worst of humanity while still finding reasons to enjoy being alive.

In Leben und Überleben (To Live and Survive), Holocaust survivor Erich Finsches carries memories that are difficult even to listen to. Yet, there is humour in him, a readiness to engage, and an opinion he is quite happy to defend. These qualities give this Matthias Ramon Jaklitsch documentary its emotional weight. We come to care about the man doing the remembering as much as the history he shares.

Written and directed by Matthias Ramon Jaklitsch, and produced by Johannes Grenzfurthner through Monochrome Film, the documentary draws on material gathered over six years. That extended companionship matters. There is a familiarity between filmmaker and subject that allows Erich to emerge with his warmth, stubbornness and contradictions intact. Jaklitsch gives him room to be someone whose company can be entertaining, challenging and heartbreaking, sometimes within the same conversation.

Erich’s recollections of Nazi persecution are devastating. His accounts of hiding, imprisonment, violence and the loss of his mother make the scale of that history painfully personal. Particularly difficult is the detail with which he remembers. The people he encountered and the things he witnessed remain present in his telling, leaving us to consider what it means to live for decades with such memories.

Erich Finsches

The documentary’s strongest quality is its attention to the life that continued around that pain. At 97 years, Erich still visits schools and attends commemorations, taking on the exhausting responsibility of explaining what happened. There is something admirable, and deeply sad, about that persistence. Having survived persecution, he continues to revisit it so that others might understand where hatred can lead.

His relationship with the filmmaker gives these public encounters a more personal foundation. The director’s involvement becomes part of the story, raising an interesting question about what it means to listen closely to someone over many years. Recording testimony is one responsibility; making space for the person carrying it is another. The film finds much of its tenderness in that shared time.

Erich’s humour is especially valuable. It allows us to spend time with him beyond the horror of his experiences. His argumentative side serves a similar purpose. There is affection in the portrait, but enough room for a personality that refuses to become tidy or easily summarised.

The film also leaves us thinking about survival itself. Erich’s appetite for life is striking, but his acknowledgement of chance prevents that vitality from becoming an easy explanation for why he lived. His strength deserves recognition without suggesting that those who were murdered somehow possessed less of it.

Leben und Überleben (To Live and Survive) finds its power in this complicated, engaging man and his determination to keep speaking. Jaklitsch’s patient approach gives remembrance a human face, a voice and a temperament. By the end, Erich’s continued willingness to meet people and share his experiences feels like a considerable act of generosity. The least we can do is listen.

I will score this documentary 3.5 out of 5 stars. It is one of those that requires some effort to sit through, but it works just fine, delivering a life story that many people would appreciate. Not just for the surviving, but also for living through the realities long after it all.