Movie: The Zone of Interest
Running Times: 1:46
Nominated for: Best Picture, Director, Adapted Screenplay, International Feature, Sound
How I watched: AMC A List
When it had me: Sound. Design.
When it lost me: I was in and out
What systems does it challenge: War Crimes, Dehumanizing your enemy
I didn't understand this film until I was writing my Nomination Day post and I realized that it's a horror film. The whole reality of the movie had sort of glanced off of me until that moment. If you don't know, it's about a family that lives in a beautiful home that shares its garden wall with Auschwitz.
The look of the film is startling. For a movie about the past it was crisp, sharp, shiny and new. 6K detail on a house that I swear has current Ikea pieces in it. It doesn't feel like then, it feels like now.
The entire film is in the sound design. That's where the truth is told. It's alarmingly well done.
I felt profoundly uncomfortable watching this film. The lack of plot felt laggy but it also gave me plenty of time to reflect, to see myself in these people, to ask myself what's on the other side of my garden wall. I didn't like any of these avenues of thought then and I don't like them now.
I'm embarrassed to admit I nodded off at an incredibly important bit of the film. I'm writing this, I'm in control, so I don't have to report to you how I messed up this screening but I feel like we've become close enough that I owe you my honesty. Mere hours after I wrote about how "I'm-such-a-fancy-coffee-drinker-now-I-don't-fall-asleep-during-movies-anymore" I actually fell asleep and missed the ending of this movie which I have since read about and man it sounds powerful!
This movie made me feel a LOT of difficult things and I'm still navigating it but I have much respect for someone who set out to curate this experience for viewers in such a precise way. I don't know if I'll ever decide I liked this film but I can say it is a powerful piece of art.
***It's going to get spoiler-y from here on out. Sort of. It's too much to read before you go see it. I'm about to have a mental breakdown of sorts. In the continued interest of me staying honest, I'll share it with you. But just watch the movie first.
I thought it was an interesting premise and couldn't wait to see where Jonathan Glazer went with the idea of the home outside the camp. Nowhere. He goes nowhere. And while I was watching the movie it bothered me. Aren't you going to make a point about this juxtaposition?
But the point is in the mundane. The point is that the immeasurable and monstrous cruelty taking place on the other side of that wall, which countless other movies have pushed us to understand, is practically an afterthought to these people who like garden parties and canoe trips down the river. But you know what? I like garden parties and canoe trips and I allow myself to enjoy those things while bombs rain down on children in Syria and the Gaza strip. How is my indifference to suffering and my incredible ability to just get on with my life any better than the fucking Nazi commander of a concentration camp? We ALL get desensitized to constant noise around us as it disappears into the background. That's a feature of human ears. But what do we do when we become numb to the pain of others and can no longer hear them cry out for aid? Is there any hope for humanity at all? Can we learn kindness? Because we aren't born with it. Fuck! (deep breath) In the end, I have to console myself that I am not the deliberate cause of any of the suffering in the world so I guess I am a little better than a Nazi commander. And since I can't concern myself with what is happening over every garden wall, I guess I had better get really focused on my own and be determined about making my own Zone of Interest a better place for everyone around me.
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