REVENGE: OUR DAD IS A NAZI KILLER

Australia, 2023, 101 minutes, Colour.

Directed by Danny Ben-Moshe.

One of several Australian documentaries where later generations of Australian citizens investigate their Jewish ancestors. From the same year came I’ll be Frank and Jewish Nazi.

Three sons of a distinguished Jewish businessman are alerted to the information that their father, a partisan, who migrated from Europe after the end of the war to Australia, belonged to a group of refugees, and networks, vowing to wreak vengeance on those who had persecuted the Jews during World War II, hunting them down and executing them..

The older son is a rabbi. The second son is a musician and supplied music for the film. The youngest son began to investigate his father with the help of his older brother, drawing on the assistance of private investigators, they uncover complicated interactions involving their father, covert vigilantes, the disappearances of alleged 90s, and all undercover.

The drama of the film is, firstly, the sons’ awareness of their father and his history in Europe, especially the persecutions, the digging of fatal pits, in such countries as Lithuania, the collaboration of the locals in identifying Jews, the rounding up of the victims, the mass shootings. There are some striking visuals of these hellish massacre diggings.

The brothers make a number of contacts, hold interviews, and eventually travel to Europe for further interviews about the situation – and in the meantime, there is video material of their father and his popular reputation.

There are always stories about World War II, the persecution of the Jews, not only in the concentration camps, but in local massacres, always horrifying – and with repercussions on the later generations.