Note: Part III of The Trial is shown Friday, May 8. In the recent murder trial of 15 former SS guards at the Lublin-Majdenek concentration camp-where it is estimated that 250,000 people were killed-the accused, invoking the German equivalent of the fifth amendment, said little; in Eberhard Fechner's documentary account of the trial, they speak volumes. Filming was not allowed in the courtroom during Germany's longest legal proceeding, lasting five and one-half years, from 1975 to 1981. Fechner instead interviewed the participants during the same period-the defendants and their defenders, prosecutors and judges, former prisoners of the camps acting as witnesses, journalists, historians and observers-editing their comments to create a Holocaust dialogue that could not have existed in the courtroom. From the victims and the accused we are given a thorough picture of a day in the life of Majdenek, the bald face of everyday horror: in their attempts to exonerate themselves the former guards rather thoroughly incriminate themselves in front of the camera. Their disbelief in the criminality of their actions manifests itself in a seeming schizophrenia. Are these monsters masquerading as normal people, or is this what normal people are like? The film also raises excruciating questions about the legal system (so inadequate in dealing with mass crimes), but faces the German people with an idea that is still very much suppressed: that "a crime against humanity still remains a crime even when it's tolerated, ordered or desired by a perverted government." Taken as a whole Eberhard Fechner's films comprise an existentialist view of history. The Trial, in addition to being a work of monumental value for historians (250 hours of film are now archivally stored for future study), fits right into the Fechner oeuvre: here was a unique chance to explore the perceived motivations of those who participated in genocide. This is no Heimatfilm viewing everyday life as history's victim; The Trial is above all about the responsibilities of individual acts.