Customer Reviews

Paper Clips

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4 star:		(9)
3 star:		(2)
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1 star:		(1)

 

 

It is so refreshing to see that there can be genuinely excellent documentaries such as "March of the Penguins" and this moving film, "Paper Clips," particularly in light of some of the schlock documentaries that have become hits in recent years. "Paper Clips" documents a project in the Whitwell, TN Middle School in which principal Linda Hooper leads dedicated students and teachers in a lesson on the meaning of the Holocaust. Whitwell is a lower middle class rural community that is almost exclusively white Christian. The members of the community set out to collect six million paper clips, one for each Jew killed by the Nazis. As word spread, contributions came from all over the country and, indeed, the world.

A group of holocaust survivors, from the Five Towns area of Long Island, New York, came to visit the community. Most people in Whitwell had never seen a Jew before but, the two groups instantly bonded. As they heard the tales of what happened in the Holocaust, there were many tears and hugs between the two groups. One student, Cassie Crabtree, was taken by how grandfatherly one of the survivors named Sam is. What happened in Whitwell is that two sets of sterotypes were shattered. The people of Whitwell learned how devestating prejudice and hatred is but, visitors to Whitwell learned how sterotypes of rural southerners as prejudiced rednecks is equally wrong and inaccurate.

It is so intensly moving to see that in our midst there are good, kindly, saintly people. The students, teachers and community members of Whitwell are truly such people. What is also moving is to see how this project grew beyond its original scope. With the help of two German born journalists, the community acquired a cattle car that the Nazis used to transport victims to the concentration camps. This car is a lasting memorial and the clips are kept in that car. Since they received such a huge number of clips, eleven million are stored there, six million for the Jews that were slaughtered and five additional million for the other victims of the Holocaust. What makes this movie so emotional is to see the genuine good that can exist in people as exemplified by the wonderful citizens of Whitwell, TN.

There is a terrific DVD which poignantly describes how a rural Tennessee Middle School engages in a project to instill a sense of diversity by teaching kids about the Holocaust. They never expected to affect so much of the life of the town, gain such a deep appreciation of the lives affected and the international involvement they earned. The lesson learned was the need to fight indifference and intolerance. A beautiful scene was the admission by a couple of Washington Post reporters that they had to get past their own deeply seated prejudices against rural southerners and discovering the love that filled their souls.

Enjoy this wonderful story.

In 1998, the students at Whitwell Middle School in rural Tennessee embarked on a project under the direction of their principal, Linda Hooper, assistant principal and history teacher, David Smith, and language arts teacher, Sandra Roberts. The goal was to demonstrate to these almost uniformly white and Christian children the tragic consequences of hatred and intolerance. When a student heard that the Nazis murdered six million Jews during World War II, he said that such a large number is incomprehensible. So the children did some research, found out that a Norwegian invented the paper clip, and that Norwegians wore paper clips on their lapels as a symbol of resistance to the Nazis during World War II. The kids started writing letters asking for donations of paper clips, hoping to collect eleven million clips, one for each victim of the Nazi regime. What started as a local project became international in scope. The students received letters from all over the world expressing support for the project. Holocaust survivors and their children, as well as a former solider who helped liberate a concentration camp, also sent letters with heart-rending anecdotes. This documentary film is a moving chronicle of the paper clip project.

Directed by Elliot Berlin and Joe Fab and written by Joe Fab, "Paper Clips" is a poignant tribute to the educators at Whitwell and to the children who enthusiastically immersed themselves in the history of the Holocaust. The film includes footage not only of the teachers and their students, but also of the former concentrate camp inmates who recount painful memories of their experiences. Two other key figures in the film are Peter Schroeder and his wife, Dagmar Schroeder-Hildebrand, journalists who visited Whitwell. The couple was impressed not only with the project, but also with the warmth of the residents of this small Tennessee town. Peter and Dagmar, who o did a great deal to publicize the project, speak on camera along with the principal, teachers, and students of Whitwell. The residents of the community explain how the paper clip project transformed them. Practically everyone in Whitwell became involved in one way or another before the project finally reached fruition.

On November 9, 2001, the anniversary of Kristallnacht, a memorial railcar that had been used in Nazi Germany to transport Jews to their deaths was dedicated in Whitwell. It is filled with eleven million paper clips and serves as a learning center for visiting students. "Paper Clips" is a simple film that exudes warmth and compassion. I recommend this documentary for children from the ages of ten or eleven through high school. It would be useful in raising awareness of the Holocaust and in imparting the idea that every one of us has the power to bring about positive change in the world.

I just spent the last 1-1/2 hours non-stop in tears watching the most incredible / wonderful movie - "Paper Clips." I cannot begin to possibly come close to telling you how moving this film is, and the following two (2) links will not suffice either. In the movie, there is an amazing German couple who helped a middle school in Whitwell, Tennessee with a four year project to learn about intolerance and hatred through learning about the Holocaust and the 6,000,000 Jews who were killed - they even helped locate, purchase, and ship from Germany to Tennessee a cattle car that was built in 1917 and later used to ship Jews to concentration camps. That cattle car now stands at Whitwell Middle School as a memorial to the Jews who were murdered by Hitler. The school children in the project began the project with starting to try to collect 6,000,000 paperclips, one for each Jew who was murdered. They ended up with almost 30 million paperclips from all over the world. One of the following links is the official link of the county school system in Tennessee and the other is the link to the official website for the movie:

http://www.marionschools.org/holocaust/

http://www.paperclipsmovie.com/

What a shame this movie cannot be shown in every home in the world.

A compelling true story, definitely worthy of any collection. Excellent direction, cinematograpy, scripting.

Paperclips is rated G, suitable for all audiences. It is about a promise to honor those exterminated during the Holocaust by collecting one paperclip for each person. In Whitwell, TN, the students at Whitwell Middle School, studying the Holocaust, wanted to understand the meaning of 6 million. So, they decided to collect 6 million paperclips.

The project inspired great interest and people from all over the world soon became involved, with many paperclips donated by families of victims and by survivors. This incredible response lead to the creation of a special museum to preserve and display the collection in a profoundly relevant manner.

Excellent sound track, my favorite song is "Jubilee" written by Charlie Barnett and performed by Alison Krauss. Brings tears to my eyes.

Paper Clips is a deeply moving and inspirational tribute, not only to the victims and survivors of the Holocaust, but to the dedicated and compassionate students, teachers, and community members of Whitwell Tennessee. The film teaches all of us the importance of facing and acknowledging inhumanities of the past by focusing on the resilience of the human spirit and the humanity that is possible when we reach out to understand and appreciate people of different backgrounds. Paper Clips is an outstanding resource for students, teachers, and families to learn about the value of community and about going beyond ourselves to embrace others and to exhibit persistence in setting and achieving goals.

This is a beautiful docu about teaching tolerance and history. A middle school in rural Tenn teaches students about the Holocaust and to visualize the number 6 million, the collect paper clips. The honesty and realization by the project is lovely and will make you cry. One of the best docus in a long time.

There have been very few movies that have moved me to tears and this one has topped the list. If you have any preconcieved ideas about this film before you watch it, just forget them. This film is totally unique and has no comparison to anything ever done on this subject before. When it's released for sale to the general public, you can be sure I will purchase it to show my friends who had missed it while playing in the theaters.

I know this review has told you next to nothing about this movie and it was intended that way to help spur you on to seeing it for your self and I hopoe you will.

I hesitate to say this is a wonderful MOVIE, because it would suggest that the filmmakers are somehow responsible for the film's content. Granted, it's a documentary, and things like fancy camerawork, beautiful location shots, and dramatic panning shots might add to a documentary such as MARCH OF THE PENGUINS, but PAPER CLIPS is different.

The documentarians are there simply to serve as the vessel to get the story out. Nothing more, nothing less. And I give them credit for simply doing that. Because it is the teachers and children in Whitwell, Tennessee that fully deserve to have their story told.

A tiny, little town of some 1600 people about 40 miles northeast of Chattanooga, Tennessee, Whitwell is NOT the place I would have expected to hear about a multi-year middle school project that focused on the Holocaust. Perhaps this is because of my OWN "Northeast bias," but I give these folks a LOT of credit. As they mentioned in the movie, there is not one Jewish person who lives in this town... how unselfish of them to instill in their youngest citizens an awareness of the horrors of racism taken to its most extreme degree.

What starts out as a discussion about the holocaust, leads them to a project of symbolism. When told of Hitler's extermination of six million Jews, one of the students remarks that they can't really comprehend what the number "six million" represents.

So they set out to find something that thay can collect six million of in order to give deeper meaning to the enormity of the Holocaust. They settle on paper clips, and after a few months, they realize that it's likely going to take them the better part of a decade to reach their goal.

But then word gets out about the project. And when Tom Brokaw announces what's going on in little Whitwell, Tennessee on the NBC Nightly News, the WORLD finds out about it... and not only do literally TONS of paperclips start pouring into the little burg, but they also start getting visits from Holocaust survivors.

The scenes where the men and women who made it out of the concentration camps come to the school to tell the stories of their loved ones who did not, is to say the least, extraordinarily moving.

In the end, the people of Whitwell placed an incredible memorial at the Middle School. I won't give away what it is, but suffice to say, it is NOT simply a colossal pile of paper clips. In fact, if I ever find myself traveling in that part of the country, I would feel compelled to visit. And to tell the people of Whitwell how wonderful they are.

That's saying a lot, given the fact that it started out as a simple middle school study project.

- Jonathan Sabin

A town just miles from where the KKK was founded. Who would expect such a life changing experience for the children of a small town in Tennessee? I brought my sons to see this movie and I recommend all parents do the same. It is well crafted documentary of what started as an school project to understand the holocaust, but as with all such things involving children it surprises, delights and touches the soul. This is a wonderful movie and gives everyone that watches hope.