Je n’avais que le néant (All I Had Was Nothingness)

On the anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz concentration camp on January 27, 1945, the Jewish Museum Berlin is showing the documentary film Je n’avais que le néant (2025) by Guillaume Ribot to accompany the exhibition Claude Lanzmann. The Recordings.

Lanzmann spent twelve years producing Shoah (1985), a groundbreaking work that took a fundamentally new approach to depicting the Holocaust in cinema. Four decades later, filmmaker Guillaume Ribot delves into over 220 hours of unpublished footage from Shoah. In an effort to capture the reality of the Holocaust, Lanzmann conducted interviews with victims, witnesses, and perpetrators from around the world. He embarked on an unprecedented journey that—including doubts, setbacks, and false leads—resulted in a milestone in film history.

Ribot uses only Lanzmann's own words, excerpts from his memoirs, and previously unseen footage to pay tribute to one of cinema's masterpieces and the director's tireless quest to tell untold stories.

Following the film, there will be a discussion with director Guillaume Ribot and Christoph Hesse from the Leibniz Center for Literary and Cultural Research (in French and German).

Courtesy of MK2films.

In cooperation with the French Embassy in Germany