Note: This review may not make much sense if you haven’t seen Schindler’s List, but if you haven’t go watch it as soon as you can.
“I Could Have Done More” from the Schindler’s List soundtrack is one of the most heart-wrenching pieces of music I have ever listened to.
Music often rekindles memories in our minds, bringing sentiments and feelings flooding back.
For movie soundtracks, the songs have a very direct link to a moment, since it coincides with what you are seeing on screen. For a movie like Schindler’s List, this brings forth powerful emotions.
The song “I Could Have Done More” plays near the end of Schindler’s List, when Oskar Schindler is fleeing from the advancing allied forces.
Schindler—a member of the Nazi Party in Germany—owned a factory and employed Jewish workers, sparing them from the extermination camps. Over the course of the war, as he began to realize the true aims of the Nazi Party he once supported, he began to hire more and more workers, not for the purpose of making money, but to spare them from the death camps. His workers purposely make substandard shells and ammunition to disrupt the Nazi war machine. By the end of the war, he had spent nearly every last dollar of his once large fortune, and in doing so he saved more than 1,100 people.
“I Could Have Done More” plays as he is fleeing Germany as the Allies approach and says goodbye to his workers. He is presented with a final gift, from those who he saved – a ring with the words “Whoever saves one life saves the world entire” written in Hebrew.
This causes Schindler to consider the fact that he was literally trading money for human lives, and he thinks back to all the money he has wasted throughout his life. He looks at his car, realizing the money he could have made from selling the car could have allowed him to hire—and therefore save—10 more people. He takes the pin off of his coat and realizes that since it is gold, he could have saved one or two more people had he sold it.
The combination of Schindler’s realization and the amazing violin solo makes this one of the most powerful moments in film in my opinion, and even without the visual context, “I Could Have Done More” is an incredible piece of music.
