By Valerie Milano

HOLLYWOOD, CA (Hollywood Today) 8/4/10 — “I built Auschwitz…because I arrived on the first transport.”  With these foreboding words, Polish artist Marian Kolodziej, Auschwitz prisoner number 432, takes viewers on his half-century journey from repentance to redemption in award-winning independent filmmaker Jason A. Schmidt’s new short documentary, The Labyrinth.  The 37-minute documentary short is receiving its world premiere on August 13^th at the International Documentary Association’s 14th Annual DocuWeeks Theatrical Showcase Shorts Program at ArcLight Cinema in Hollywood, which qualifies it for consideration for The Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences’ annual Oscar® Awards.

Filmed on location in Poland, this subtle and remarkable film takes us on a deep and winding journey into the extraordinary pen and ink drawings of Holocaust survivor Marian Kolodziej, who entered Auschwitz on June 14, 1940on the very first prisoner transport as a 17 year-old member of the Polish Underground Movement

Using quiet narration, the artist’s own words, and a compassionate, slowly moving camera, we are taken on an unforgettable journey into the human heart, its darkest, most complex  aspects as well as its most redemptive and loving features. An Oscar-worthy documentary film, The Labyrinth explores the many caverns and catacombs of a man’s art, immersing the viewer into a personal journey of horror and redemption– it is nothing less than a profound meditation on what it is to be human, the full spectrum, from the darkest of humanity’s suffering into the light of hope and the salvation of faith.

Kolodziej survived not only the horrors of Auschwitz, but those of Buchenwald and Gross-Rosen to spend the next 50 years as an acclaimed scenic designer in his native Poland.  It was only after suffering a debilitating stroke in 1993 that he took up pen and ink to relive the ashes and the apocalypse of World War II’s most notorious death camp. This remarkable film demonstrates one man’s resilience in the face of unspeakable terrors.

Filmmaker Jason A. Schmidt, who also co-produced and co-directed the award-winning documentary short Franz Jägerstätter: A Man of Conscience, trusts both his material and his audience.  Wearing multiple hats as director/writer/editor/producer, Schmidt has an unerring sense of mood and momentum, letting both Kolodziej’s words and the drawings cry out their truth to audiences of a new millennium.

The Labyrinth also represents the collaborative efforts of a Hollywood filmmaking dynasty, The Schmidts, who grew up here in Hollywood: Academy Award-winning film editor Arthur Schmidt is executive producer; Ron Schmidt, SJ is producer, and Gregory J. Schmidt, SOC is Director of Photography.  Their father, Arthur P. Schmidt was an Oscar-nominated editor for Sunset Blvd. and Sayonara and also edited Some Like It Hot and Sabrina, among many other films. Jason A. Schmidt is a gifted and talented director who takes the family’s exceptional filmmaking gifts into the 3^rd generation.

The Labyrinth, which takes its name from the maze-like cavern in the basement of a Catholic Church which houses over 300 of Koloziej’s drawings, is an unforgettable journey of the soul of an artist   This remarkable film is showing at Hollywood’s ArcLight Cinema thru August 19^th.