Premiere of the Documentary Film 33 Photos from the Ghetto
Watch the premiere of an extraordinary new documentary film, 33 Photos from the Ghetto, which is deeply connected to the work of POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews.
The film will premiere globally on Tuesday, January 27, 2026, (9:00-10:20 p.m. ET/PT) on HBO Max, marking International Holocaust Remembrance Day. If you cannot watch tomorrow, you will be able to view the documentary later on HBO Max platforms and channels in multiple languages.
This powerful film must be seen because it tells the remarkable story of the discovery of long-lost photographic negatives containing unique images from the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising in 1943. One set of photographs was taken secretly from inside the ghetto by Zbigniew Leszek Grzywaczewski, a 23-year-old Polish firefighter. These are the only known photographs from within the ghetto during the uprising that were not taken by the Germans.
The photographs and negatives by Grzywaczewski were discovered while preparing POLIN Museum’s 2023 temporary exhibition marking the 80th anniversary of the uprising, Around Us a Sea of Fire: The Fate of Jewish Civilians During the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising.
POLIN Museum subsequently published What the Others Cannot See: Photographic Testimonies from Both Sides of the Warsaw Ghetto Wall 1943 as a two-volume boxed set. One volume is dedicated to Grzywaczewski and the other to Rudolf Damec, who photographed the burning ghetto from outside the walls. Seen together, the two bodies of work—one from inside, one from outside—create an extraordinary visual testimony to the uprising and its aftermath by two Polish civilians. These photographs are now on deposit in the collection of POLIN Museum.
The film brings this exceptional discovery—and the human stories behind it—to a global audience at a time of rising antisemitism.
You can view the trailer here: 33 Photos from the Ghetto
Watch this film and reflect, with us, on the power of historical discovery and the responsibility of remembrance—values at the heart of POLIN Museum’s mission.