O ZWIERZĘTACH I LUDZIACH

Based on archive footage and interviews with contemporary witnesses, the film tells the story of Żabiński, the second director of the Warsaw Zoo, who moves with his wife and children into a villa on the zoo's grounds in early 1929. The outbreak of war puts an abrupt end to the family's carefree nature: the animal population which had survived the bombing of the city is shipped off to the "Reich" by the conquerors, while the zoo itself is turned into a pig farm and then an allotment. A little later, Żabiński comes into contact with the Warsaw ghetto via the Jewish entomologist Szymon Tenenbaum, and he and his family are subsequently able to help hundreds of Jews to escape, initially hiding them in the zoo, and then getting them papers or finding other hiding places ...

The documentary describes the cynical extermination policy of the German Nazi leadership and its armed forces, as well as the attempt to save a piece of humanity over time and thus become a lifesaver. PN