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The Zone of Interest-Jonathan Glazer

Unlike Jonathan Glazer's other film I had seen this year (Under The Skin) which I wasn't overly impressed with, I thought The Zone of Interest was a monumental film that struck exactly the chord I hope for when I go to the movies.

If correlating to the common High School metaphors that critics use, I believe The Zone of Interest is his Junior feature film effort. "Birth" being freshman, and Under the Skin his Sophmore.

While I have no frame of reference to Birth, as I haven't seen it yet, I thought his strides forward since Under the Skin to be tremendous in terms of skill. There was absolutely nothing desultory in his direction this time around and I thought the signature marks that are unique to Jonathan Glazer's style were executed brilliantly.

As Wes Anderson's preferential element in front of the lens tends to be the films photography, which at times plays out almost as a character itself in the film (I.e. the snow in Fargo is a good example), Jonathan Glazer's Ace in the hole is his skill in using sound as the invisible third man. This begins from the outset, as you sit in the theater staring at a black screen for around five minutes, which deliberately sets the mood for the rest of the film. You see nothing, but hear everything, and as the picture begins to develop you have by then acclimated your senses to hear first and then piece together the puzzle with pictures as it goes along. Vocal tones tell the story of The Zone of Interest, the words themselves, emotions, and interactions simply do their part as cogs in the wheel to turn the story from one scene to the next.

A film like this, which focuses on arguably one of the lowest points in the history of mankind, and shows nothing, but leaves you with a nauseating feeling of having just watched a live vivisection, speaks metaphorical volumes to its impact. You hear the gunshots, hear the screams, but are only shown the indifferent faces of those who are witnessing these things play out first hand.

And the indifference itself is what leaves such a potent thumbprint of disgust.

Smokestacks billowing out clouds of human vapor contrasted with a bourgeoisie woman trimming her garden. Or children playing on a swing set in their backyard, which is abutted by the thatched rooftops of an extermination factory and a barbed wire fence, serve as the real exclamation marks of the film. Glazer tattoos the imagery into your retina with angst inducing long-play scenes that make you want to scream at the characters with outrage for their blatant inhumanity.

You as the viewer hope that some board to the head will knock a semblance of consciousness into at least one of the characters, to become cognitive of human decency. But no. The Jews we see in the film are treated as nothing more than subservient furniture that just happen to have a pulse. Who, most of the time, are lambasted for their ungratefulness at having been saved from the smokestacks and have the honor of being butlers to their executioners.

There are countless films that touch on the atrocities of the Holocaust, but I don't believe one has been executed with unique deftness as Glazer did with Zone of Interest. It is a true testament to the art form of story telling through auditory senses. You can only show so many people being shot in the head, ran over by cars, or used as human guinea pigs as they have in films like The Pianist, Men Behind the Sun, and Schindlers List before a new direction becomes mandatory to maintain the impact. All of which are great films within their own right. But after a while, the gore-shock erodes and the audience needs something a little more potent to remind them just how horrifying these atrocities actually were. And I feel Glazer did just that, without showing the audience one single death.

Stars: ****

Verdict: Watch

Cousins: The Pianist, Men Behind the Sun, Schindlers List, Salo (or the 120 days of Sodom), Come and See

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