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Imagine the house of your dreams; lovely cottage-style house, spacious, huge garden, a greenhouse, and a pool with a slide. That's the life that Hedwig Höss (Sandra Hüller) is not willing to let go, which she makes very clear to her husband Rudolf (Christian Freidel). They're living "beyond how [they] dreamed", so when Rudolf is set to be transferred to another town, she refuses to. After all, this is the home they've dreamed of for their family, right next to the Auschwitz concentration camp.
Set during World War II, The Zone of Interest follows the lives of the family of Rudolf, Nazi commandant of the Auschwitz concentration camp. As the war rages on, he and his family are settled in a house right next to the camp; a house where they live their best lives, enjoy picnics, swims in the river, garden parties at the pool, all while next door, the most terrible atrocities are occurring. But director Jonathan Glazer makes the bold choice of not showing us *anything* that happens beyond the wall; all we get are the horrifying sounds.
The Zone of Interest is an impressively crafted film. The direction and cinematography are meticulous, and the ice cold performances are on point. However, I won't deny the fact that after it finished, I was left more puzzled than impressed. But then, it happened. As the days went on, the film slowly crept up inside of me to the point that I just couldn't stop thinking about it. Unlike this family, the constant sounds of machinery, the screams of anguish and horror, the ever-increasing gunshot sounds, they're all things you can't ignore.
You could transpose the basic premise of the family to any other setting: family adjusting to a new place, while the father has to deal with changes in his job, which presents new sacrifices to the whole family. But setting this seemingly mundane premise to World War II Auschwitz just puts a whole different spin to the word "sacrifice" which the family speaks of. For a moment there, we might see ourselves absorbed in the family drama, but the sounds are too much, the horrors are too many to ignore. So is this film.
Grade:
THE ZONE OF INTEREST
(2023, Glazer)
A film nominated for Best Picture or Best International Feature in the upcoming Oscars
(2023, Glazer)
A film nominated for Best Picture or Best International Feature in the upcoming Oscars
"The life we enjoy is very much worth the sacrifice."
Imagine the house of your dreams; lovely cottage-style house, spacious, huge garden, a greenhouse, and a pool with a slide. That's the life that Hedwig Höss (Sandra Hüller) is not willing to let go, which she makes very clear to her husband Rudolf (Christian Freidel). They're living "beyond how [they] dreamed", so when Rudolf is set to be transferred to another town, she refuses to. After all, this is the home they've dreamed of for their family, right next to the Auschwitz concentration camp.
Set during World War II, The Zone of Interest follows the lives of the family of Rudolf, Nazi commandant of the Auschwitz concentration camp. As the war rages on, he and his family are settled in a house right next to the camp; a house where they live their best lives, enjoy picnics, swims in the river, garden parties at the pool, all while next door, the most terrible atrocities are occurring. But director Jonathan Glazer makes the bold choice of not showing us *anything* that happens beyond the wall; all we get are the horrifying sounds.
The Zone of Interest is an impressively crafted film. The direction and cinematography are meticulous, and the ice cold performances are on point. However, I won't deny the fact that after it finished, I was left more puzzled than impressed. But then, it happened. As the days went on, the film slowly crept up inside of me to the point that I just couldn't stop thinking about it. Unlike this family, the constant sounds of machinery, the screams of anguish and horror, the ever-increasing gunshot sounds, they're all things you can't ignore.
You could transpose the basic premise of the family to any other setting: family adjusting to a new place, while the father has to deal with changes in his job, which presents new sacrifices to the whole family. But setting this seemingly mundane premise to World War II Auschwitz just puts a whole different spin to the word "sacrifice" which the family speaks of. For a moment there, we might see ourselves absorbed in the family drama, but the sounds are too much, the horrors are too many to ignore. So is this film.
Grade: