Inside Hana’s Suitcase

When Fumiko Ishioka, the director of Tokyo's Holocaust Education and Resource Centre, opened the package of artifacts loaned by the Auschwitz Museum in March 2000, she had no idea how the few items INSIDE HANA'S SUITCASE only hinted at the life of the suitcase's owner. By researching Hana Brady, Ishioka hoped to give a group of Japanese schoolchildren a better understanding of “what can happen when people hate each other.” Director Larry Weinstein effectively restages Ishioka's quest to learn all she could about Hana Brady and then uses real actors to dramatize Hana's story, which began in the Czech Republic during World War II when the Nazis invaded the small town of Moravia where the Bradys were the only Jewish family. While archival photographs, testimonies from family friends, and commentary from schoolchildren from Toronto (where George Brady settled after the war), Tokyo, and the Czech Republic help round out Hana's story from her internment at Terezin to her transport to Auschwitz, it's George's remembrances that are the film's most moving moments. This graceful and powerful multi-layered documentary serves as a teaching moment about the Holocaust for parents and children of all ages. – C.K.