Awards, Press & Interests

Hitler's Silver Box

MAX BLOOMBERG’s home in a Chicago suburb is invaded by strangers in the middle of a cold winter night. The elderly Holocaust survivor is dragged from his bed and brutalized in an attempt to learn the location of a silver box he made some fifty years before. Max’s closest relative, Dr. BRUCE STARKMAN, chief ER resident at Chicago’s Cook County Hospital is plucked from total immersion in his profession by the mysterious deaths first of his Uncle Max and a short time later of Bruce’s ex-girlfriend, a hospital social worker. It’s only when Bruce finds his uncle's hidden journal detailing Max’s ordeal in Theresienstadt concentration camp, where he was forced to make a unique box for Adolph Hitler’s birthday using silver extracted from the teeth of prisoners, that some of it begins to make sense. Bruce learns his uncle is able to survive in the camp by his wits and because he’s befriended by another older, more experienced prisoner, CHAIM HOROWITZ. Max escapes with the box and the document it contains and buries them in Czechoslovakia's Bohemian Forest as German solders close in on him. Saved by American troops, he emigrates to Chicago and opens a small used-bookstore. He’s never either willing or physically able to return to look for the box. Recognizing both deaths as murder, the young physician also realizes a worldwide Nazi resurgence is imminent unless he finds and destroys the secret document written by Nazi leaders and hidden in the silver box. The never-copied, handwritten manuscript holds details of the locations and means of funding of Nazi scientists who continue to operate secretly throughout the world, developing horrendous weapons that will endanger all of mankind. The Allies were closing in, preventing the Nazis from writing a replacement, making the paper invaluable to future Nazi revival. The search takes Bruce and Chaim’s granddaughter MIRIAM, a tough, attractive Israeli woman, who becomes Bruce’s ally and lover, to Paris and the Czech Republic. On this journey, the two are incessantly pursued and attacked by groups of Nazis, led by GERHARD, a particularly clever and vicious German Nazi. At first, Gerhard attempts to befriend Bruce, pretending to be Jewish. Bruce learns Gerhard recently suffered from a ruptured brain aneurism. The couple finally elude their enemies long enough to discover the silver box. As the Nazis close in, Bruce and Miriam are wounded in a firefight, but succeed in killing all the Nazis except Gerhard. Bruce then blows up the box and its contents with a grenade. ? Bruce drives with difficulty to a hospital to seek medical help. Miriam is barely conscious; he’s bleeding from a bullet wound, and they have lost all their weapons. It's midnight, and they’re followed by Gerhard, who has a silencer-equipped Glock. ? Bruce slips into the hospital, leaves Miriam in the ER and staggers through the building trying to lead Gerhard away from his sweetheart. Bruce ends up in the corridors of the X-Ray Department and finds the MRI room. Gerhard is close behind, trapping Bruce in the equipment-filled space. Remembering Gerhard's aneurism and knowing the metal clips that are used after such operations often will be dislodged by a strong magnetic current, Bruce throws the switch and turns on the powerful MRI magnets. In a short time Gerhard has a seizure and loses consciousness. Bruce starts resuscitation on his enemy. By the time other medical personnel arrive, it's obvious that while Gerhard will survive, he has suffered a massive brain hemorrhage and most likely will remain in a vegetative state for the remainder of his life. ? Bruce and Miriam realize their love will eventually bring them back together, but for now they must return to their duties in different countries far away from one another.