Who Plays Who?

Daniel Craig Liev Schreiber Jamie Bell Alexa Davalos George MacKay Allan Corduner Mark Feuerstein Tomas Arana Jodhi May Kate Fahy Iddo Goldberg Iben Hjejle Martin Hancock Ravil Isyanov Jacek Koman Jonjo O'Neill Sam Spruell Mia Wasikowska Mark Margolis Zoe Rosenblum Sakalas Uzdavinys Saulius Janaviciu Leonas Ciunis

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Tuvia Bielski Zus Bielski Asael Bielski Lilka Ticktin Aron Bielski Shamon Haretz Isaac Malbin Ben Zion Gulkowitz Tamara Skidelsky Riva Reich Yitzchak Shulman Bella Peretz Shorshaty Viktor Panchenko Konstanty 'Koscik' Kozlowski Lazar Arkady Lubczanski Chaya Dziencielsky Jewish Elder Sarah Oppenheim Lova Volkin Israel Kotler Accountant

What Do The Critics Say

"Ed Zwick has cornered the market on movies about nearly forgotten wartime battles between members of a minority and the dominant culture that's oppressing them." Lawrence Toppman CHARLOTTE OBSERVER "Not just another Holocaust story, this is a gritty, poetic film based on the true saga of Jewish refugees who fight the Nazis while living in the frigid woods of Belarus." Bruce Bennett SPECTRUM "Its story of courage and responsibility is undeniably compelling." Connie Ogle MIAMI HERALD "An absorbing family saga, a thrilling combat movie and a backwoods epic that conveys the feel of a frontier community under duress with the vividness of a John Ford classic." William Arnold SEATTLE POST INTELLIGENCER "Powerful, gripping and quite remarkable. Daniel Craig gives the performance of his career." Peter Hammond HOLLYWOOD.COM "A great service has been done in bringing this narrative to the screen." Peter Rainer CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR "The film celebrates and memorializes the survival of something unthinkable, and a group of people for whom defiance meant, at heart, that they would push against the growing darkness and carry on." Moira MacDonald SEATTLE TIMES

"Defiance presents a fresh and engaging view of World War II that's all the more startling because it's based on the actions of a real Belorussian family." Dan Lybarger EFILMCRITIC "Deserves a commendation of merit for making us cognizant of an often overlooked event." Keith Cohen ENTERTAINMENT SPECTRUM "Craig and Schreiber are terrific as the slightly thuggish Bielskis, and they're joined by an able supporting cast that includes Jamie Bell and the wonderful Mia Wasikowska." Ann Hornaday WASHINGTON POST "Zwick thrives on these sorts of historical action flicks, and he pumps the adrenal glands throughout." Phil Villarreal ARIZONA DAILY STAR "Audience will be moved by the characters efforts to embrace life and love in the face of such tragedy." WILLIE WAFFLE "It's still a gripping yarn, intelligently crafted, worth seeing. Schreiber is superb." Christopher Tookey UK DAILY MAIL "Joseph Stalin, who famously opined that "Jews make poor warriors," never met the Bielskis. This is a war story told with passion about a band of brothers that still has the power to inspire." Peter Travers ROLLING STONE

The Inside Story "We may be hunted like animals, but we will not become animals. We have all chosen this: to live free, like human beings, for as long as we can. Each day of freedom is a victory. And if we die trying to live, at least we die like human beings." Tuvia Bielski, "Defiance". In the summer of 1941, Hitler’s army was on the move. Europe would soon fall to its overwhelming might. For millions, it would be an inescapable death sentence. But for the Bielski brothers: three young, Jewish, working-class farmers from the remote countryside of Belarus; it became something else: a call to arms from which they would not turn away, one that would test the limits of their courage, their brotherhood, and their will to defy the evil around them, as they came to lead thousands in a desperate battle for survival against overwhelming odds. Edward Zwick ("Glory" & "Blood Diamond") brings this extraordinary, untold story to the screen as an intensely moving action-drama about the complicated nature of vengeance and salvation; the power of community; and the will to live when all hope seems lost. Shot in Lithuania with a devoted international cast and crew headed by Daniel Craig ("Layer Cake"), Liev Schreiber ("The Manchurian Candidate")) and Jamie Bell ("Billy Elliot"), the filmmakers painstakingly sought to recreate a story that is not only remarkable unto itself, but also an important new look at one of the cinematic myths of World War II. Just as Zwick previously revisited a hidden chapter of the Civil War and its African-American regiment in his Oscar winning film "Glory", he now explores a stirring reality that has been all but ignored in the movies: the brave resistance of those who refused to go without a fight. "The popular iconography of the Holocaust has mostly been one of victimization. It’s important to add complexity to that notion," says Zwick, "to understand that there is a difference between passivity and powerlessness, that the impulse to resist was always present. "Defiance" is about those who managed to fight back, but it is also about the enduring conflict between the desire for revenge and the desire to save others. It’s a story that compels us to ask ourselves: What would I have done in those circumstances? And in that way, I think, it becomes a deeply personal experience." After five generations of saved lives, a tale of epic courage at last comes to light. The story of the Bielski brothers and the community they formed in the dark and wintry forests of Nazi-occupied Eastern Europe remains one of history’s most compelling tales. The story first came to light: if only momentarily; when in 1944 at the war’s end, local Gentiles witnessed an astounding, almost surreal sight: more than twelve hundred Jews suddenly emerging from the deep woods. At first, the locals believed them to be ghosts. How, they wondered, could these few have survived while so many thousands were sent to the death camps. In whispers and rumors, pieces of the story began to emerge. In a time of growing anti-Semitism, the Bielskis had been raised on the family farm in Stankevich (in what is now Belarus but was then under Soviet control). Physically imposing and charismatic, the brothers were known as scrappy fighters, rebels with an aversion to authority. When the Nazis invaded in June 1941, overwhelming the region with a massive air and ground attack, the brothers were quickly identified as potential trouble-makers and targeted by the SS as well as by the local police. A series of devastating tragedies followed in quick succession as the Bielskis’ parents and many beloved family members (including Tuvia’s infant daughter and wife) were killed in a mass execution of four thousand Jews in the Novogrudok ghetto. To save their own lives, the brothers escaped to the local woods: a vast, thickly overgrown area they had known since childhood. There, able to hide from their persecutors, they formed a fledgling partisan group, determined to fight the Nazi occupation and those cooperating with them. But what began as a battle for survival and a quest for vengeance soon grew into something that transcended both agendas; a commitment to save as many Jews as possible, young and old, rich or poor. Under Tuvia’s leadership, that mission succeeded beyond anyone’s imagination. In time, the Bielskis even dared to venture back into the ghettoes, offering a chance of escape to those Jews helplessly facing deportation and death in the concentration camps. After months of relentless pursuit, often forced to move at a moment’s notice in an endless search for a safe haven, they eventually forged a makeshift village in the Naliboki Forest, living in underground dugouts (known as zemlyankas) and eventually creating a makeshift hospital, a mill, a metal-shop, a bakery, a bathhouse and eventually even a theatre and synagogue. Children went to school, couples fell in love and got married, everyone, young and old, contributed in whatever way they were able. And a community was born. Meanwhile, the Nazis placed huge bounties on the brothers’ heads, hoping to stop what soon became an inspirational folk tale to those desperately in need of some kind of hope. Amidst the surrounding horror, this secret encampment grew so full of life they named it "Jerusalem in the Woods". When the war ended, the Bielski's story was nearly lost to time. Tuvia and Zus moved first to Israel, then to New York, where they quietly led hard-working, ordinary American lives as taxi-drivers and truck drivers. It was only after Tuvia’s death in 1987, as researchers began exploring the history anew, that their story became better known. Most prominent among these historians was Dr Nechama Tec, Professor Emerita of Sociology at the University of Connecticut who, in 1993, published her award-winning book "Defiance: The Bielski Partisans". When screenwriter Clayton Frohman read Tec’s book, he was completely at a loss as to why this story of tenacious Jewish resistance and courage was not better known. People had heard of the ill-fated Warsaw Ghetto uprising and of gentile rescuers such as Oskar Schindler, yet absent was any other evidence of Jewish resistance. "I grew up in the Jewish tradition, read a lot about the Holocaust, and my father was an American soldier in World War II, so I thought I’d heard a lot of the most interesting stories from that time. But I’d never heard about the Bielskis. I felt right away that this was a necessary story to tell: of the people who fought back, who would not submit. All my life I had heard about Jews who were victims. Helpless, resigned, doomed. And that was the Germans’ intention; that we only think of them as such. And they almost succeeded. What makes this film so important to me is that it tells the other side of a story that was almost lost." While attending a Dodger’s game, Frohman gave Tec’s book to his good friend, Edward Zwick. A single reading was all it took for Zwick to understand Frohman’s passion for the story, and he determined to do everything he could to bring it to the screen. Thus, began a collaboration that was to take more than ten years before finding its way to the screen. "One of the great human impulses is that of bearing witness, of keeping memories alive," says Zwick. One of the biggest challenges of bringing the story to life was finding a way to compress three years of harrowing struggle, sibling rivalry, and physical hardships into a two hour movie. Zwick did not want to whitewash the violence committed by the partisans in the name of survival. "The Bielskis weren’t saints. They were flawed heroes, which is what makes them so real and so fascinating. Yet I think they also found within themselves something unexpected and magnificent," Zwick stated. Other questions faced in the forest were of a more intimate nature. The concept of the 'forest wife' and 'forest husband' took hold. Relationships were sometimes forged as much out of practicality as romance. "I think it’s a story that continues to have great resonance in this day and time because we all want to be part of something bigger than who we are alone," says producer Pieter Jan Brugge ("The Pelican Brief"). The Bielski were, in many ways, typical as brothers, loving yet competitive, loyal yet fiercely individualistic. Zwick hoped for just such a dynamic to emerge between the actors he had cast. "Daniel and Liev developed a lovely, bantering, playfully competitive relationship off-screen that brought unexpected humor and feeling to their scenes together," Zwick said. "Daniel and Jamie became very close as well, with Daniel taking on an almost mentoring, older brother role, both on and off camera." "I was fascinated right away by Tuvia’s ability to take action, and by his willingness to take enormous risks for others," Craig says, "but I also think he was not that different than many others in that time. It’s just that he was successful and lived, so we can now tell his story." As Tuvia’s son Mickey, says of his father: "He was a man of contradictions. I always saw him as a man who had both terrible strength and great goodness living side by side. They were equally important parts of him as a man, and sometimes I felt those qualities to be at war with each other." If Tuvia’s strength and steadiness made him a natural leader, his younger brother Zus's charisma and volatility was perfectly suited to a man of action. "Zus is someone who is always driven to fight," says Tony Award winning actor Schreiber ("Glengarry Glen Ross"). "He starts out believing that the most important thing is to make someone pay for the loss of his family and for all that he has endured." Jamie Bell ("Jumper") plays the third Bielski brother, Asael. "I liked that Asael is very focused on uniting the family, on loyalty, and that he grows from being the man in the middle into becoming his own person." Bell notes that their performances were helped by an almost instant chemistry. "It was just fascinating how quickly Liev, Daniel and I developed this sibling dynamic. Even just hanging out on the set, Daniel had this kind of older brother thing going on with me. And it was easy for me to look up to him in that way, as well. He’s a fantastic actor, seemingly unfazed by his rise to fame, and he’s a guy at the peak of his career who’s handling it all brilliantly. What’s more, he’s in love with filmmaking." Mia Wasikowska in the role of Chaya, a city girl who captures Asael’s heart. "I learned so much making this movie. It’s really opened my eyes." she said. Danish actress Iben Hjelje was cast as Bella. "If you were going to die, and they knew they might, I think they all believed it would be better to die in the freedom of the natural world." Alexa Davalos plays Tuvia’s life-long wife, Lilka. 'I think its her ability to stand up for what’s right that draws Tuvia to her." Synopsis

The year is 1941 and the Jews of Eastern Europe are being massacred by the thousands. Managing to escape certain death, three brothers: Tuvia, Zus and Asael Bielski take refuge in the dense surrounding woods they have known since childhood, after their family is slaughtered on their farm. Here they begin their desperate battle of survival against the Nazis. At first it is all they can do to stay alive. Gradually, as whispers of their daring spreads, they begin to attract others; men and women, young and old, who are willing to risk everything for the sake of even a moment’s freedom. Tuvia's leadership and his decisions are challenged by Zus, who worries that Tuvia’s idealistic plans will doom them all. Asael (the youngest), is caught between his brothers fierce rivalry. As the brutal winter descends, they must work to create a community: to keep faith alive when all humanity appeared to be lost.

The Verdict "Many tales have emerged from WW2, the most prominent in recent times being Steven Spielbergs 1993 production, "Schindler's List", which picked up seven Oscars including Best Picture, Best Director, Best Writing & Best Original Score. Fast forward to 2009 and cinemagoers are treated to "Valkyrie" (Tom Cruise), "Good (Viggo Mortensen)" and "The Boy In The Striped Pajamas" (Asa Butterfield & Jack Scanlon). Now, Oscar winner Ed Zwick ("Shakespeare in Love") who, by the way, directed Best Supporting Oscar winner Denzel Washington in "Glory", brings to the screen, this emotive tale of survival that until 1993 was unheard of. Three brothers, Tuvia, Zus and Asael Bielski are the heroes of this harrowing story of survival against what was near impossible odds. While the Germans, under the direction of the S.S. were exterminating Jews and cleansing the Jewish Ghetto's, these brothers took to the Naliboki forest in the Baranowicze region of Poland (now Byelorussia) and forged a community that somehow managed to survive. The Bielski's story is one that has recently been dogged by controversy. Questions have been raised as to whether they were heroes or thugs. Zwick's film, while slightly flawed, provides a fascinating insight into what forrest life and the constant struggle for survival entailed. Craig, Schreiber and Bell all perform extremely well as do the main players in the cast list. "Defiance" conveys a feeling of 'being there' and, the harsh reality of the responsibilty that went with leading and maintaining order in such a large group. Well worth the effort! 4 STARS." The Production Team

Director Screenplay From the book Producers Original Music Cinematography Film Editing Casting Production Designer Supervising art director Art Direction Set Decoration Costume Design

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Edward Zwick Clayton Frohman and Edward Zwick "Defiance: the Bielski Partisans" Pieter Jan Brugge & Edward Zwick James Newton Howard Eduardo Serra Steven Rosenblum Gail Stevens Arturas Zukauskas Dan Weil Daran Fulham Yann Biquand Véronique Melery Jenny Beavan

Run Time 136 minutes Rated M [AUST] Copyright ©2009 - Paramount Vantage - All Rights Reserved ©1999-2009 All Rights Reserved The Movie Pages - Protected by Australian & International Copyright. Trademark Laws Apply.