The Zone Of Interest film review: Monstrous people come in worryingly normal guises
Shot on location in Auschwitz, director Jonathan Glazer’s remarkable new film lays bare humanity’s capacity to disassociate from atrocities
War stories have tended to be told from the perspective of the just and the wronged, but this courageous, meticulous and horribly fascinating film doesn’t just square up to evil and look it in the eye. The Zone Of Interest spends almost its entire duration in the company of those who perpetrate and profit from genocide. And it’s worrying to witness just how normal they seem.
Loosely based on Martin Amis’ 2014 novel, this is the latest work from Under The Skin director Jonathan Glazer, who releases films sparingly (just four since 2000) and really makes them count. This film focuses on the day-to-day lives of the commandant of one Auschwitz concentration camp, Rudolf Höss (Christian Friedel), and his family, including his houseproud and aspirational wife Hedwig (fine work from the ever-excellent Sandra Hüller), whose home and spectacular garden sit right next to the camp and its audible atrocities.
One of the most despicable figures of WWII, who oversaw the murder of 430,000 Hungarian Jews, killed in just 56 days, Höss is a slippery, enigmatic and unsurprisingly chilly figure here; and yet, in his domestic interactions, he’s unnervingly ordinary. Hedwig, meanwhile, goes about her business as if she is any other housewife. She may not be an active participant in slaughter but is gobsmacking in her callousness; we see how she’s happy to turn a blind eye and receive the spoils of war, in the form of stolen clothes and jewellery.
The film’s attention to detail is astounding. Shot on location at Auschwitz, the sound design from Johnnie Burn and co is perhaps its greatest strength. The team strived for authenticity and what they have achieved in relation to the camp’s soundscape, with its industrial churning and clanking, and sporadic screams and shots, feels sickeningly plausible. With ominous noises seeping perpetually into the Höss home and smoke billowing grimly in the background, every bit of chitchat, laughter or affection becomes sinister, crass or breathtakingly banal.
Glazer is from a Jewish background himself and the angle at which he comes at this most sensitive of subjects is undoubtedly risky, but he has achieved something truly remarkable here. As easy as it is to loathe the family at its core, this provocative film also forces us to identify with them. Shot in a detached manner, often with hidden cameras, The Zone Of Interest speaks volumes about humanity’s capacity to disassociate from horror and hardship, even when it’s right on our doorstep. It’s a warning against dismissing those who do harm as mere monsters, and a reminder that apparently respectable people can be a lot more dangerous than you’d think.