THE ZONE OF INTEREST

Standing on the wrong side of history

Christian Friedel as Rudolf Höss. Copyright: A24

Spoilers for The Zone of Interest (2023). Trigger warnings for discussion of Nazism, genocide and racism.

The Zone of Interest will be remembered as one of the most disturbing films about the Holocaust ever released, and it does this not by focusing on the horrors suffered by those imprisoned in the concentration camps but by focusing on the normal lives of those who implemented it.

Using Martin Amis’ novel of the same name, Jonathan Glazer is more explicit in the use of real events. While Amis used the Nazi commandant Rudolf Höss as the inspiration for the novel, the characters were fictionalised. Glazer specifically makes the film about Höss, as well as his wife Hedwig, and their children as they go about their lives just over the wall from Auschwitz.

A lot has been said about the banality of evil; however, this suggests a lack of responsibility on the perpetrator’s part. The Zone of Interest is not concerned with this. What makes the film so terrifying is that everyone is aware of the wider implications of their actions, and yet away from their work, they continue to be normal people. Normal people do not inadvertently cause harm through their actions, they sometimes are just evil.

Auschwitz hangs in the background during the first half of the film, with Glazer never going into the camp but simply having it loom over the normal family activities. Copyright: A24

There is an element of dissociation to these events, which makes later parts of the film so disturbing. A group of Nazi officers discuss the logistics of moving hundreds of thousands of Hungarian citizens to the concentration camps and the conversations resemble a large corporation discussing the delivery of parts to a factory. The people who would lose their lives are dehumanised, not to protect the psyche of those making the plans, but because Nazi officers genuinely saw those killed in the Final Solution as less than human.

However, disassociation is not a healthy, long-term solution to dealing with stressful events. It is essentially the mind protecting itself, refusing to acknowledge the events that are happening and rebelling against the body.

Throughout the second half of the film, Glazer integrates more experimental filmmaking techniques into the cold, objective style that dominates. The most affecting is in the final moments. Heading back to an apartment in Berlin after celebrating the implementation of the Final Solution, Höss (Christian Friedel) walks down a staircase.

Read about Jonathan Glazer’s previous film, Under the Skin, by hitting the link below:

As he descends to each floor, the hallways gradually get darker. He stops at the bottom of one staircase and gags, struggling to compose himself. The descent into blackness is a blunt representation of the man’s actions and how he has reached a point beyond redemption. The retching, too, highlights this. Quite literally, his body is unable to stomach the things that he has done, the things that have been locked away and minimised in his mind through the justifications of the Third Reich.

It's a moment of humanisation. You could argue that this is undeserved for a man who was responsible for such atrocities, and yet the strength of the film is how it humanises people who could easily be written off as monsters. This not only minimises the deeds but increases the risk that we could allow it to happen again. Believing that terrible things are done by people who are somehow other, allows normal people with evil intentions to go undetected.

Sandra Hüller as Hedwig Höss. Copyright: A24

There’s also an element of self-reflection. As Höss struggles with his retching, he suddenly looks up, staring directly into the camera. Glazer then cuts to the modern day, as workers at the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum clean and prepare for opening. The stark imagery of thousands of pairs of shoes, jewellery and other personal items stacked behind the glass is a reminder to the audience of the human loss that the Nazi regime implemented.

But it can also be read as Höss subconsciously realising that he is on the wrong side of history. That his actions will not be remembered as some great event in a Nazi-controlled Europe, but as part of one of the greatest tragedies in modern history. When we cut back to the man in the darkened stairwell, he composes himself and walks further down into the blackness.

Writer/director: Jonathan Glazer. Based on the novel of the same name by Martin Amis

Starring: Christian Friedel, Sandra Hüller