NJ man's daring escape from Nazi slave labor is the subject of a documentary
Robert Max had many distinctions. He was a Jewish World War II veteran and, before his death in August 2020, he was the last known living survivor of Nazi slave labor.
Now, Max's life has been immortalized in a documentary.
The Jewish Federation of Greater MetroWest NJ honored Max this month and hosted a webinar to talk about "Bob Max: The Long March Home," the documentary made about him and his daring escape.
Max was captured during the Battle of the Bulge and forced into slave labor by Nazi soldiers who made him fix rail lines damaged by the Allied forces. He and his fellow POWs would sabotage the work.
They suffered months of abuse, disease and frigid temperatures. "I could see nothing ahead but death," Max said.
But he and two others escaped during a death march by jumping into a hedgerow. They later foundshelter with a family in a village called Reichenbach and hid in their hayloft until the Nazis were driven out of the area by American troops in 1945.
'The coolest guy ever'
On the panel this month was documentary director Greg Parker; Henty Bassman, a Vietman War veteran and friend of Max's; Linda Forgash, a director at the Jewish Federation; and Brett D'Alessandro, veteran and co-founder/CEO of Backpacks for Life.
D'Alessandro, whose nonprofit helps homeless veterans, was the one who thought of creating a documentary about Max after he heard the fellow veteran's story. The pair were connected by another nonprofit that asked D'Alessandro to pick Max up for a speaking event at a school. Max lived in Summit.
"I just remember opening the door and I just saw the big smile, and Mr. Max was just right there, front and center," D'Alessandro said. "This is the coolest guy ever."
They bonded during the drive. D'Alessandro was amazed at the story the older man had to tell. D'Alessandro felt a deep connection with Max, whom he called a "beautiful soul." On some of his bad days, D'Alessandro would phone him just to talk.
He watched Max speak at the school and on the way home, asked if anyone had made a documentary about him. When Max said no, D'Alessandro decided on the spot that he would make it happen.
"I have to do this, this story needs to be told to all of these kids," D'Alessandro recalls thinking.
He reached out to Parker, whom he had worked with before. Parker met Max and was enthralled by the veteran's storytelling.
ROBERT MAX: NJ veteran, one of the few remaining who escaped Nazi labor camp, tells story of survival
"He started to tell his story and he was staring at me the entire time," Parker said. "I was looking at him and I was like, this needs to be encapsulated."
The director said it was like "everything disappeared" when Max would speak of what happened to him. "I was just seeing his face as he was telling it to me."
He kept that aesthetic in the film, with Max's face one of the only things seen against a black background. Those images are interspersed with archival footage and sketched animations.
"It was very special and it was extremely deep," Parker said.
Max also chronicled his experiences in an autobiography, "The Long March Home," published in 2017. He was motivated by his wife's encouragement and by hearing Elie Wiesel speak about why he wrote his Holocaust memoir, "Night."
Forgash, of the Jewish Federation, said Max was also inspired to write when his then 9-year-old grandson, Emerson, asked him if he had been in World War II. Emerson was featured in a remembrance of Max at the end of the webinar, along with his other grandson, Xander, and Max's children Wendy and Doug.
There is a permanent exhibit about Max's life at the New Jersey Historical Society in Newark that includes his brother's letter home to their parents telling them that Max was alive. His brother was a company clerk in the Army.
Bassman got to know Max as a member of Temple Sinai, where Max was a former president.
When he first heard Max's story, "I was absolutely enthralled," Bassman said. "And I felt his story crucial because I had known about the Holocaust and what it did to our people since I was a young child, but to learn that the brutality of the Nazis extended not just to gypsies, homosexuals and people who had mental problems, but to anybody who was not them. Anybody who was not a member of their group was doomed."
Max did not have to go to Europe to fight during World War II. When he joined the Army at 19 after reading about what the Nazis were doing, he was a "hotshot" clarinet player and joined the Army band, said Forgash.
Swing band leader Jack Leonard had set aside the orders for Max to be shipped out. But Max told Leonard that he couldn't sit out the war.
Leonard said: "Kid, if you leave now, you're not ever coming back." Had it not been for Max's determination, the band leader's words would have come true.
Max was able to watch the documentary several times before he died, according to his son. Parker said Max was "so pleased with the film" and that it preserved his story while capturing "the imagination of the viewer through the visual and vocal combination."
"I save that," Parker said. "I put it in my heart and I was like, I'm never forgetting that."
The documentary is free to view on Vimeo.
Kaitlyn Kanzler covers Essex County for NorthJersey.com. For unlimited access to the most important news from your local community, please subscribe or activate your digital account today.
Email: kanzler@northjersey.com
Twitter: @KaitlynKanzler8
This article originally appeared on NorthJersey.com: 'Bob Max: The Long March Home' film tells story of NJ Jewish WWII vet
