Without doubt the most emotionally moving film I have ever seen.The atmosphere created cuts through the fact that it is a movie and puts any normal person actually there.Absolutely the most accurate portrayal of the lowest point of human behaviour ever.It still beggars belief that a so-called civilised nation could embark on the systematic annihilation of people purely based on their religion.God forbid this should ever happen againI cried several times and I am not an emotional man.

I will pick my words carefully when reviewing this movie, since I do not mean to offend any person who has lived through the horror the death camps of Belzec, Treblinka, and Sobibor. What happened in the east of Poland during World War II was so horrifying it defies reason, understanding or explanation.So I don't mean to put down the people that lived through these horrors, but examples of heroic Jewish uprisings during the second world war, like the escape from Sobibor, are very rare indeed. That is not to say the Jews were not brave, but simply that they were not given the opportunity for bravery, in a world that turned against them so completely, that even for those who complied to every torturous labor, every outrageous disciplinary measure, each moment could be your last, and fighting against the German oppressors could get your family killed as well.In that respect, this movie gives us a romanticized take on the role of the Jews in World War II. A common criticism of Schindler's List is that it portrays the Jews as nothing more than meek victims, which I think is a strange criticism, since Schindler's List just realistically shows the predicament the Jews were in during the war. My criticism of this film is that it portrays the Jews as victors over a cruel oppressor. With the greatest respect for the hardships these people had to face, most unfortunately, that portrayal is simply not true, even though this film reenacts a historic event that did happen.Taking that into account, this movie is quite honest about the fate of most Jews during the war. It hardly could avoid to show the nasty sides of a death camp like Sobibor. Particularly informative, and historically accurate as far as I understand it, were 2 scenes in the movie. One is a scene at the start of the film that shows the way new arrivals are welcomed with music and promised good treatment, and hot showers. Secondly, the scene in which a little boy is sent over to run an errand at the gas chambers, and we get a glimpse of what went on there. This second scene is also the most horrific scene in the movie, and shockingly graphic. I doubt if a scene as harsh and realistic as that one would make it into any "mainstream" movie made these days.I liked the acting by the main characters, almost all of these are pretty good for a TV movie. Having said that, the portrayal of the SS-officers wasn't very subtle. They were just portrayed as evil beasts feasting on beer, and discussing why it would or would not be okay to sexually abuse Jewish women. Of course those kinds of discussions would have taken place, but there is not one moment showing camaraderie amongst them, or any "pleasant" conversation between them, and this made them little more than cardboard cut-outs.This is where movies like Der Untergang (Downfall), and Schindler's List really rise above the more generic Word War 2 movies. In showing us the human side of the Germans, they can show us what is most frightening about the atrocities of the holocaust : that it was executed by human beings, who were somehow capable of shutting off their conscience when it came to their orders to kill and torture millions of defenseless and innocent people.All in all this isn't a bad movie. It gets a lot of things right that other movies didn't. For example it does show the willingness of some Jews to torture and oppress their fellow men to save their own lives, and to gain favour with the Germans. But it fails to ask the truly hard questions, thereby reducing these painful examples of human weakness to nothing more than a plot-point, and that's too bad. They missed a wonderful opportunity to explore the psychological implications of being on the wrong side.My point is that, on both sides, people behaved as people do. Imperfect, heroic sometimes, but at other times cruel, cowardly, deceiving. It is very rare for a WW2 movie to grasp those nuances, and though this film makes a good effort, in those aspects it didn't succeed.

***Spoilers*** Of all the German concentration camps it was Sobibor that was the first to be slated to be liberated by the onrushing allied armies in WWII. In that it was the closest to the Soviet Union's borders situated in the extreme eastern section of Poland near the forests of the border city of Lublin. In that way it made sense that it, Sobibor, was slated to have the the greatest escape attempt by it's some 600 inmates in WWII. With the Soviet Red Army about to burst into German occupied Poland in the fall of 1943 it was there at Sobibor on October 14 of that year where the sentenced to death Jewish inmates of the camp decided to put their foot down and stage an armed and violent break out of the camp. That in the end cost most of them their lives but also had as many as 200 live to see another day. Which they wouldn't have if they decided to not to break out of the camp and just meekly wait for the Germans to exterminate them.It was Jewish Red Army POW Let. Alex Pechersky, Rutger Hauer, who got the ball rolling by organizing the epic escape in knowing with the Red Army within striking distance of the concentration camp it wouldn't be long for the German to liquidate it together with it's reaming Jewish inmate! That in order to cover up the crimes, that they would be charged with after the war, that they committed there. Pechersky together with camp inmate Leon Feldhendler, Alan Arkin, began to planed a massive escape from the camp before the German and their Unkrainian guards begin going into action and exterminating every last inmate in Sobibor.Meticulously planned the escape runs into a number of problems that has it put into motion far earlier then expected with the German's getting wind of it in discovering a number of dead German SS men, killed by the inmates,before the escape plan was to be put into full operation. Having nothing to lose Perchersky & Feldhendler jump start the escape that despite its success ended up with the majority of the escapees gunned down and killed by German and Ukrainian bullets and land mines that ringed the camps perimeter! But the alternative in doing nothing and being lead like lambs to the slaughter would have been far worse!Factual account of the largest concentration camp escape in WWII history that had the once indestructible and feeling racially superior Nazis get a taste of their own medicine by the downtrodden inferior and imprisoned Jews whom they had nothing but contempt for. In it fact was a Pyrrhic victory for those that escaped with their dead far outnumbering those of their captors but it paid dividends in the end. In them being able after the war to bear witness to the Nazis crimes committed at Sobibor and have those who ran the camp end up paying for them.

Much film has been done about the holocaust from virtually all angles, and this film fits right in amongst them. Now, I wouldn't say it is the best, not by a long-shot, but it has suspense and more-over and more importantly, a reality background which the film-makers kept close to, backed with closing pictures of the camp today and what happened with some of the survivors. That adds to the value of this film.However, the film is not as good as it could have been unfortunately. I found the acting being less than average at a few points but especially Rutger Hauer do a good job throughout the film. Then we have my pet peeve that everybody speaks English which removes some of the authenticity but its OK. The SFX was less passable, but again, OK. I found a couple of factual errors as well, but nothing that distracted the overall impression.Overall though, I would recommend this to watch as a complement to The Grey Zone. They both show uprisings in camps, but The Grey Zone do it much grittier. Simply put, this is a good movie.