Wiesel was a survivor (but his parents and younger sister were not). That will always define his identity, especially because Wiesel started writing and speaking to bear witness, before acts of public remembrance were encouraged. Although not an immediate bestseller, Night became an acknowledged classic that paved the way for more such works.
Rudavsky also chronicles Wiesel’s personal rebirth, marrying his wife Marion, with whom he had the child he once resolved to never bring into the world, their son Elisha. This might be the most inspiring aspect of Wiesel’s story, which Rudavsky does full justice. Instead of an unknowable voice of conscience, Wiesel emerges an acutely human and humanistic husband and father.
However, Rudavsky (who also helmed the entertainingly neurotic rom-com The Treatment) quickly dispenses with Wiesel’s life-long support for Israel with one soundbite expressing empathy for those who identify as Palestinian and one talking-head claiming Wiesel refused to criticize the democratic nation publicly.
The film ignores the controversy that ensued when the London Times refused to publish Wiesel’s ad criticizing Hamas’s use of children as human shields during the 2014 Gaza War. Instead, Rudavsky devotes considerable time to more pressing controversies, like Pres. Reagan’s 1985 visit to the German Bitburg military cemetery. (Seriously, it garners over eleven minutes out of a total 86-minute running time.)
