History Film / EscapeFromSobibor

* KickTheDog: Quite often (sometimes in the form of siccing dogs on prisoners), but one sad example is the thirteen woodcutters caught trying to escape are forced to each pick the man who will be executed with them as an example. When they try to refuse their told that far more people will be executed unless they go and personally pick thirteen more people to be killed. There is also a threat that any prisoner who looks away during the execution will be shot with the 26.

** When the prisoners on a wood cutting detail here shoots that two men (who were by the river getting water and do manage to get away clean) have gotten away several of them try to make a run for it themselves, even though the guards are more alert at the moment and their inside the fence (although the gate ''is'' open). The Kapo are smart enough to grab a few men and stop them from running and those who try are caught and executed along with several others to make an example.

* KickTheDog: Quite often (sometimes in the form of slicing dogs on prisoners) but one sad example is the thirteen woodcutters caught trying to escape are forced to each pick the man who will be executed with them as an example. When they try to refuse their told that far more people will be executed unless they go and pick thirteen more people to be killed personally. And then they add that any prisoner who looks away during the execution will be shot with the 26.

* SadisticChoice: After a group of prisoners is caught trying to escape, Sergeant Wagner not only has them publicly executed, but he forces each of them to choose a "partner" from the audience to die with them. He threatens to have fifty random prisoners executed if they don't obey.

* UncertainDoom: Of the three men who try to run away from the camp in the first scene one is blown up by a mien and the guards are seen firing after the other two but (at least in some cuts of the film) it’s never confirmed they gunned the two down before they reached the trees.

* WhatHappenedToTheMouse: There's a certain gap between number of confirmed prisoners who died during or after the escape and the number absolutely confirmed to have survived the war. Of the characters in the film [[spoiler:Luka and Moses]] ''might'' have survived but it seems unlikely given that they never had themselves known or tried to contact anyone else after the war.

** Itzhak motions for his wife to claim to be a seamstress in the lien and for a moment it looks like she (and maybe their son) will be saved but the guards pass over her due to her young child and send them to the gas chambers with the others.

* GoryDiscretionShot: The film uses this whenever a character is murdered. One exception is [[spoiler:when the Nazis execute 26 prisoners for trying to escape (actually only 13 tried to escape; the other 13 were randomly selected to die to further dissuade any future escape attempts) and tell the others that anyone who averts his/her eyes will be executed.]] The scene is shot from a long range though.

* WhereAreTheyNowEpilogue
* WhipItGood: One of the guards orders Shlomo and Moses to make a gold engraving of a twisted snake on the handle of his whip.

** [[spoiler:While it was not shown in the film, the real Sasha Pechersky successfully fled to the USSR, but was forced to abandon his companions and was later conscripted to a penal battalion, a standard practice for escaped Soviet prisoners of war. He was released after recounting his ordeal to an officer, who encouraged him to tell his story, and later contributed to documentation of Nazi crimes. Leon Felhendler meanwhile survived to see the Nazis driven out of Poland, only to be murdered by a group of antisemitic Polish nationalists a month before the war ended.]]

* RiddleForTheAges: Sergeant Beckmann is walking towards the baracks (where a trap is waiting) when he pauses and then walks in the opposite direction. He isn't aware of the escape attempt at the time, but why he avoids falling into the trap is unclear.

* TheUnfought: Sadistic SS officer Gustav Wagner survives the uprising unharmed, due to being on holidays at that time. In fact the uprising is largely successful due to his absence. In real life, Wagner escaped justice and died in Brazil in 1980 as a wanted fugitive and unrepentant Nazi.

* WhatTheHellHero: Schlomo calls out the other prisoners for working for the people who killed their families. Leon responds with IDidWhatIHadToDo.

* WhipItGood: One of the guards orders Sholmo and Moses to make a gold engraving of a twisted snake on the handle of his whip.

** [[spoiler:While it was not shown in the film, the real Sasha Pechersky successfully fled to the USSR, but was forced to abandon his companions and was later conscripted to a penal battalion, a standard practice for escaped Soviet POWs. He was released after recounting his ordeal to an officer, who encouraged him to tell his story, and later contributed to documentation of Nazi crimes.]]

* BigBrotherInstinct: Shlomo (although he doesn't realise it at first) saves Moses' life by declaring him to be his assistant goldsmith. [[spoiler: Possibly averted since it is not known what happened to Moses after the brothers escaped.]]

* BigBrotherInstinct: Shlomo (although he doesn't realise it at first) saves Moses' life by saying Moses is his assistant goldsmith.

** Sholmo saves the lives of a cousin and nephew along with his brother Moses in real-life but Moses has the role of all three.

* BadassLongcoat: Sacha and several Russian prisoners wear ones.

* SlaveMooks: The Kapos. Also to a certain extent the Ukrainian guards.[[note]] Many (if not most) of them were Soviet [=POWs=] who either volunteered or were pressed into service by the Nazis.[[/note]]
* SmartPeoplePlayChess: Leon and several of his friends hang around a chessboard on occasion.

* WouldHurtAChild: [[spoiler:Sergeant Wagner shoots Naomi's baby after killing her.]] In addition to that there is an agonizing number of lose-ups of oblivious little kids getting off the troop transport at the beginning, soon to be gassed without any qualms.

''Escape from Sobibór'' is a 1987 British MadeForTVMovie that dramatizes the 1943 escape of over three hundred prisoners from the Sobibór extermination camp. Inmates who were selectively spared for their skills in manufacturing material goods plot their escape from the camp, in part utilizing the skills they possess to make it happen. The film stars stars Creator/AlanArkin, Creator/JoannaPacula and Creator/RutgerHauer; it is based on the book of the same written by Richard Rashke, and camp survivor Thomas Blatt (who helped Rashke with his book) served as a consultant. There were plans for a sequel, following the escapees of the camp trying to survive until the Allied victory in Europe, but it was canceled due to a negative reaction from the Ukranian government, over their perceived negative portrayal in the form of collaborating guards.