Adapted from a novel by writer/director Jonathan Glazer (Sexy Beast), The Zone of Interest is a drama that gives a devastating glimpse at the fringes of World War II and The Holocaust.
A German family lives a relatively normal life of peaceful calm amid a horrifying truth. Their activities belie a disturbing reality when it is revealed that they live next to the Auschwitz concentration camp. Gradually more details are revealed that show evidence of mass killings, and when the father, Rudolph Hoss (Christian Friedel), the commandant, is notified of an upcoming transfer to another camp, it upsets the mother (Sandra Hüller) who desperately hangs onto her family’s idyllic life.
The film, with its perverse realism, is about people insulated in their ‘zone’ surrounded by a different reality. Rarely has a film projected such a unique point of view for a war period film. By depicting the life of a Nazi family, it defies the conventional settings of wartime drama (The Great Escape, Mrs. Miniver). From the outset, the film succeeds in projecting a misleading impression of a peaceful setting masking evil and death. Violence is never shown, and yet clues like smells and sounds are just as shocking in their grim implications especially when the family rifles through new clothing from a questionable source. When Nazi planners meet, their dispassionate discussion of efficient, concentration camp ovens are in stark contrast to inhumane behavior.
Methodically
paced, the film feels like a
semi-documentary with its straightforward narrative. Accompanied by a spare, ominous score, there
is interesting use of sound, color, and transition, and though not all scenes
work, (like a jarring flash forward at the crematorium, and a confusing subplot
with a girl who helps the Jews), this well-executed parable’s subject matter
alone should garner attention.
****1/2
of *****
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