Culture News Blog

There are profound words written on a Holocaust memorial that is tucked away in the most unlikely of places, the schoolyard of a former Tennessee coal-mining town.

"We ask that you pause and reflect on the evil of intolerance and hatred."

The memorial is housed in a vintage 1917 German railway car that was used to transport Jews to Nazi death camps. Inside, there are historical displays and 11 million paper clips, six million to represent the genocide of the Jews, five million more for the Gypsies, homosexuals, dissidents and others who died as a result of Adolf Hitler's racist warmongering.

How this all came to be - as odd and disquieting and remarkable as it feels to outsiders - is the subject of an inspirational documentary film entitled Paper Clips, opening today at the Princess Theatre.

The unadorned film, co-directed by Elliot Berlin and Joe Fab, chronicles how three teachers in the Tennessee town of Whitwell (pop. 1,600) created a learning project to teach Grade 8 students about cultural diversity. Principal Linda Hooper and teachers Sandra Roberts and David Smith chose the Holocaust because there are no Jews, and barely any diversity at all, in their predominantly white Protestant town.

Then they watched in amazement as the project morphed into a life-changing experience.

The humble paper clip, invented by a Norwegian, turned out to be an appropriate symbol. Norwegians wore them on their clothing during the Second World War to subtly protest Nazi oppression.

The students and teachers needed something tangible to visualize what a number such as six million means. With its symbolic origins and small size, the paper clip seemed like a way to count. Project organizers sought out donors.

Tom Bosley, Tom Hanks and several U.S. presidents contributed clips. Jews got involved. German students sent an old suitcase containing personal notes to Anne Frank, each asking forgiveness. Media escalated the drive.

The cumulative effect is overwhelming because we see - in action, in words, in the outpouring of emotion - how the people of Whitwell came to embrace and even cherish the people of another culture, the Jews. In some cases, as with teacher David Smith, the project let him shuck off the ignorant bigotry he says he had learned from his own father.

What the documentary lacks - and this is one of two reasons that a five-star subject matter became a less-than-perfect film - is an affirmation that the students connect the lessons of the Holocaust to other human issues. You wonder if they understand the history of black slavery in the U.S. or complex issues involving Muslims and U.S. foreign policy.

The other problem is the banal, sentimentalized music that refuses to let the viewer commune quietly (a blend of Jewish and Appalachian folksongs would have been stunning).

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