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The Zone of Interest (2023) – J. Glazer
A new movie about the Holocaust raises many questions. Do such films trivialize or exploit the
unspeakable horror of the murder of six million Jews (and others) or do they
serve as a worthwhile reminder of the way that humans have and can rationalize evil
acts (and/or the banality of evil, as Hannah Arendt noted) for which we should
be on constant guard? Jonathan Glazer’s film invites us to view (or, in fact,
listen to) the events at Auschwitz from a detached distance – unlike the
visceral “you are there” experience of Son of Saul (2015) or the overwhelming amount
of specific detail provided by Claude Lanzmann’s nine-hour Shoah (1985). But knowing the true nature of the horror is
a sort of pre-requisite for the dread that Glazer provokes with the Zone of
Interest, named for the area around the concentration camp where the camp
commandant and his family live. Christian Friedel and Sandra Hüller play the
commandant and his wife, living in the shadow of the camp (we see it in the
background of most outdoor shots) and living off the work and possessions of
those being exterminated. As viewers, we never enter the camp and only see it
from the outside but importantly hear what goes on as a distracting backdrop to
the action we do see (mundane household actions and discussions of the work of
the commandant, using terrible euphemisms for killing or discussing the mechanisms
for killing in a matter-of-fact way).
This creates a sort of divided consciousness for viewers and leads
directly to the question of what the family members (children and adults alike)
must be thinking while hearing and experiencing the camp next door – in other
words, you know that they can’t not know. Glazer and his team based the film only
loosely on Martin Amis’s novel but also on extensive research on Commandant
Rudolf Höss, Auschwitz, and the years 1943-44. They find numerous ways to present the indirect
effects of the camp, leaving the greater horror looming in the background, with
only its shadow on show. But whether
this be warning, memorial, educational opportunity, or introspective public art,
it only serves to present one view of the Holocaust, to make one specific point
about those involved -- but perhaps that’s sufficient in the face of the
enormity of the catastrophe and our inability to come to terms with it. Notwithstanding the possibility for morbid
fascination, understanding the Holocaust from all angles, with every good faith
contribution warranted, seems necessary.