I would be lying if I said I enjoyed watching The Zone of Interest. I think it’s a phenomenal film, but I was thoroughly sick to my stomach for nearly the entire hour-and-45-minute runtime. The film takes place during World War 2, and follows Rudolf Höss, the chief commandant of the Auschwitz concentration camp and his wife Hedwig. The couple (played by Christian Friedel and Sandra Hüller) raise their five children in an idyllic and exquisite estate that shares a wall with the camp. The audience never step foot inside the facility however, instead following the family as they try their best to ignore the utter terror constantly churning just a stone’s throw away.
The Zone of Interest, 2023. Directed by, Jonathan Glazer.
The atrocities of The Holocaust are framed in a way reminiscent of how the Höss family deal with it all. Indefensible acts being carried out are often obscured or out of frame entirely, leaving the audience to infer what the protagonists are desperately trying to bury. There are moments where I found myself almost entertained by the Höss family’s domestic life, until I was swiftly reminded of the ashes laid to allow their luscious garden to flourish (and no, that’s not just a metaphor). For example, there is a scene where the Höss family and some of their friends are playing in their pool and sliding down a wooden slide into the water. You’re facing away from the concentration camp and for a moment, it is out of your mind. Until you see smoke rolling through the air above the garden’s wall. It’s a train. Suddenly you’re wrenched back into reality as you grasp the fate of those aboard, and feel awful for watching these people enjoy themselves for even a moment.
The Zone of Interest’s sound design is phenomenally chilling. The gunshots, screams and sounds of burning are something you can’t just look away from, no matter how much you might want to. There are moments in the film where the screen is left blank or the sound is juxtaposed by a beautiful flower, leaving the audience to imagine the agony and utter despair that they’re hearing. The separation of the audio and visuals is elegantly realised as a metaphor for how the Höss’ separate themselves from The Holocaust. This is illustrated best in a scene where you hear Hedwig chatting to her friends at a small table about mundane pleasantries while the camera follows a Jewish servant girl rushing about the house, avoiding those deemed more important than her, and making sure everything is prepared for the Höss’ to go about their day without having to lift a finger.
The sheer terror of The Zone of Interest is heightened by the fact that the Höss family are real people who actually lived in a villa attached to Auschwitz. Rudolf and those higher in rank than him discuss better designs for their “crematoriums”, by which they mean incinerators, or tactics for increasing the facility’s “efficiency” with such bureaucratic, inane depravity and is truly nauseating. The only instant where Rudolf seems like he cares about anything is when he issues a warning to SS soldiers at the camp about picking from the lilac bushes, demanding they be careful not to cause the bushes to bleed and to limit the amount they are picking, lest the bush not have any flowers left. This is the first time Rudolf is shown to have an ounce of empathy towards any living thing, and it is for the bushes that decorate a gas chamber.
The Zone of Interest, 2023. Directed by, Jonathan Glazer.
Director Jonathan Glazer did a fantastic job conveying The Zone of Interest’s visual language. Framing a pure white sheet hanging on a washing line in front of where you would see entrance to Auschwitz, or when the Höss’ are quietly having dinner, one of the camp’s watch towers looms outside of the window behind them. These kinds of visual metaphors immerse you in the film’s horrible reality.
Jonathan Glazer’s latest foray into the horrors of humanity is an absolute masterpiece that I don’t plan on ever seeing again, in the best way possible. It will undoubtedly be a hard watch for most, as it should be, but I think it’s a must watch for anyone who thinks they can stomach it.
You can watch The Zone of Interest from Monday the 29th of January to Sunday the 4th of February at the Somerville Auditorium through Perth Festival.