classicsoncall Review of The Champion

The Champion (2020)

"These are no longer your fights. You fight for us!"

[8/10 · 1 November 2022]

This film is certainly deserving of more viewers than the number rating it here on IMDb, and with only eleven reviews (as I write this), it's a story that merits a much wider audience. The thing that strikes is the incredible inhumanity on display in the way the Nazi concentration camp guards physically beat and indiscriminately kill prisoners on a mere whim. There's the mental aspect as well, demonstrated when an announcement is made that the prisoners will never leave the camp alive. It leaves little hope and all but the faintest will to survive from day to day. Amidst this setting, Tadeusz 'Teddy' Pietrzykowski (Piotr Glowacki) emerges as an unlikely hero to the prisoners of the newly opened Auschwitz Concentration Camp, one whose infamy grew throughout the Second World War. Recognized as a former championship caliber Polish athlete, Teddy is selected to fight against a handful of German prison guards, and almost always successful, manages to earn an allowance of bread and medicine for his fellow inmates. A side story involves Teddy's compassion for a young male prisoner he takes under his wing, only to end in tragedy under the brutal conditions of the camp. Any recommendation I could make to watch this movie has nothing to do with entertainment value, as the scenes and conditions depicted are too bleak. The value of pictures like this are instructional and inspirational, helping us recognize that the intolerable conditions shown have no place in human conduct and must be prevented from ever happening again. Though it's a difficult picture to watch, one comes away with an understanding of how an indomitable spirit can keep even the faintest glimmer of hope alive under the harshest conditions.