Narrated by Academy Award-winning actor Adrien Brody, Violins of Hope – Strings of the Holocaust, follows the journey of Israeli master violinmaker Amnon Weinstein and his efforts to restore violins from the Holocaust. The collection of violins represents an incredible history of suffering, courage and resiliency. They belonged to starving Jewish refugees who carried them during the death marches in World War II Europe, to concentration camp victims who were forced to play during the execution of tens of thousands of innocent people, to desperate inhabitants of the ghettos where children often played for crumbs, and to those in the work camps where millions died a slow death from starvation and disease.
Their amazing stories are blended into Weinstein’s mission to not only collect and restore the violins, but to send them back out into the world where they are played by renowned musicians and orchestras around the world. The program chronicles the journey of the instruments from Weinstein’s small workshop in Tel Aviv, Israel, where he has worked for two decades to repair the violins to Cleveland, where they were brought in 2015.
Guest speaker Michael Leibson, docent at Michigan Holocaust Center will lead a discussion following the movie.