Still trying to figure this out.
Who has perspective on the significance of this?
Thank you!
I assumed he was nervous/overwhelmed - so possibly naturally shaking and he just dropped it. It showed a vulnrability.
No power in the verse can stop me
I think it showed that he was anxious.
shareAs others have said to show he was nervous or emotional but I wish that scene wasn't in the movie. I hated his speech about why didn't he buy more Jews and Istak having to soothe him over and over....no, no, no. Something about that scene made me think it was a very bad ad lib. Should've been cut!
shareI thought the same. It felt shoe-horned in, as if the audience wasn't intelligent enough to deal with what was happening and needed it explaining aloud for them (if that makes sense!)
shareAgreed about the "I could have done more" scene. I just finished watching this for the first time in years and that was just a really weird, unnecessary part. It's the only scene in the entire film that should have been cut. It felt so forced that it momentarily kinda killed feeling of realism for me because it just came off like a cheesy movie cliche.
shareNot like Spielberg is a master of nuance and subtlety. His fans love the schmaltsz and easy emotion.
I don't find it very artistic.
I thought that speech was extremely moving.
shareI also hated that last scene it ruined the film for me in so many ways.
shareThe ending is misunderstood by those who think it's too schmaltzy. It's thought of as the "I could have done more, boo-hoo" scene. That does sound corny, but the scene is actually deeper than that, and the emotion is certainly earned, warranted.
Listen to the dialog carefully... this is how I understand the deeper ending, after watching the movie many times over 25 years: Oskar Schindler's terrible regret begins when Itzhak Stern says "Whoever saves one life, saves the world entire". This hits Schindler hard enough that he drops the ring, because one person's life in particular enters his mind. When the movie begins he puts on the gold lapel pin. At the end he takes it off. Those scenes are bookends. He removes the gold pin, stares at it and breaks down after he says: "This is gold. Two more people. He would have given me two for it; at least one. He would have given me one, one more. One more person. A person, Stern. For this. I could have gotten... one more person and I didn't. And I didn't!" So from getting more out if he made more money, to getting ten out if he sold the car, to getting two out or getting just one out if he used the gold pin as a bribe, he says the words for one person six times (count them). That person is the girl in the red coat, the reason why Schindler breaks down and exits the movie utterly distraught.
Just before he sees the girl dead, the screen shows this:
CHUJOWA GORKA, APRIL, 1944
Department D orders Goeth to exhume and incinerate the bodies of more than 10,000 Jews killed at Plaszow and the Krakow Ghetto massacre.
It's obvious to me that he dropped it because of the overwhelming emotion.
shareOn a mundane level I suppose Schindler dropped the ring because he was overcome with emotion and his vision was clouded by tears. But I always thought the dropping of the ring symbolized how easy it is for something valuable -- like a human life -- to slip through your fingers due to thoughtlessness.
I love the whole scene by the way. To me it's anything but "cheesy" or "shoehorned in."
Nice sentiment. Thank you for your thoughts :)
shareThank you for your thoughts on this scene. I will think of them next time I watch this scene. I needed a new perspective.
shareOn a mundane level I suppose Schindler dropped the ring because he was overcome with emotion and his vision was clouded by tears. But I always thought the dropping of the ring symbolized how easy it is for something valuable -- like a human life -- to slip through your fingers due to thoughtlessness.
I love the whole scene by the way. To me it's anything but "cheesy" or "shoehorned in."
I have watched this movie over and over again, crying every time in more than 1 place. I felt he dropped the ring because he was so moved by the gift, that they related to him and didn't see him as a Nazi. They appreciated all he had done, all he gave up to help them and he was so moved and emotional but also sorry he couldn't have helped more.
shareYou do realize that really didn't happen? It was put into the movie to create a fitting ending to his efforts.
shareSchindler was emotionally closed off to the horrors around him and was uncomfortable with being thought of as a saviour (remember when he chastises Stern for allowing the old one-armed man to thank him?)
When he is given the ring he fully realises the value of what he has done amid hell on earth, his suppressed emotions overwhelm him and he quivers, dropping the ring.
Schindler was an ebullient party animal who never truly stopped and stared the horros, or himself, in the face until that moment. It then lead to a complete emotional breakdown over how many more he could have saved had he sold his car and Nazi pin (suicidal though that would have been)
It’s a great scene, brilliantly acted by Neeson and Kingsley. The people dumping on it are both retarded and emotionally stunted.