Jewish group demands Prime remove ‘Bawaal’ over insensitive portrayal of Holocaust
The Bollywood film ‘Bawal’ has been slammed on social media for using the trauma of the Holocaust ss the backdrop of a domestic spat between a couple. Starring Jhanwi Kapoor and Varun Dhavan, the film revolves around a couple who travel around Europe to visit places central to World War II.
The film had been met with intense scrutiny, with many calling out the film makers because of several dialogues. “Every couple goes through their Auschwitz” and “We all too are a little like Hitler, aren’t we? We aren’t satisfied with what we have. We want what others have,” are two of the objectionable lines in the film.
READ MORE: Bawaal’s cringey comparison of Holocaust with relationships will give you second-hand embarrassment
https://twitter.com/prapthi_m/status/1682612366729674753?s=20You’re telling me (and @AnyaShankar) that not one person who worked on #Bawaal thought the premise was SHIT? Not the actors, editors, producers? Not anyone’s friends? Family members? NO ONE? https://t.co/Lcf996SHv9 pic.twitter.com/QG7vlgHSVk
— Somya Lakhani (@somyalakhani) July 21, 2023
The Simon Wiesenthal Center (SWC), which preserves the history of the victims of the Holocaust, has now issued a public statement where they called for the streaming giant Amazon Prime to remove the film from its service for “outlandish abuse of the Nazi Holocaust as a plot device”.
“Auschwitz is not a metaphor. It is the quintessential example of Man’s capacity for Evil,” spoke SWC Associate Dean and Director of Global Social Action, Rabbi Abraham Cooper.
By having the protagonist in this movie declare that ‘Every relationship goes through their Auschwitz,’ Nitesh Tiwari, trivializes and demeans the memory of 6 million murdered Jews and millions of others who suffered at the hands of Hitler’s genocidal regime.
If the filmmaker’s goal was to gain PR for their movie by reportedly filming a fantasy sequence at the Nazi death camp, he has succeeded. Amazon Prime should stop monetizing Bawaal by immediately removing this banal trivialization of the suffering and systematic murder of millions of victims of the Nazi Holocaust,” Rabbi Cooper concluded.