The Zone of Interest welcomes the audience with a black screen filled with an ominous sound that makes us anticipate the worst. We imagine that when that first image finally appears on the screen it will be terrifying. But director Jonathan Glazer’s intention is different. The first thing we see is a peaceful day in the countryside and a family enjoying themselves on river banks. Although what we see is not disturbing, the anticipation and the music have created in the audience the objective of disturbing and making the mind invent distressing scenarios.

Just like that first sequence, the film uses music and off-screen to build a narrative that hits us psychologically in a methodical, slow but relentless way. We position ourselves again in the context of Nazi-occupied Poland. Specifically, we are going to the disastrous concentration camp in Auschwitz. There we follow the life of the German commander Rudolf Höss (Christian Friedel), his wife Hedwig (Sandra Hüller), his children, and even his dog. The family lives peacefully in a huge house, with beautiful gardens, on the other side of the wall… desolation and terror. Contrary to what we are used to in films about the Holocaust, in The Zone of Interest we do not explicitly have the atrocities of the Holocaust. Horror enters our veins with the sounds heard in the distance, the music that always oppresses us, and the constant tension that remains from beginning to end.

The zone of interest

Director of Photography Lukasz Zal has been behind the lens in two of my favorite films of recent years: Ida (2013) and Cold War (2018) here he once again shows the great talent he has for capturing the human soul with each frame. His camera slides through the hallways of that house and sometimes only remains fixed to make us complicit as guilty spectators. We know what transpired behind that wall that separates Commander Höss and his family from hell. We don’t need to see it, just put ourselves in the context and see those subtle details that are creepy. The distribution of clothing, the ashes that serve as fertilizer for the flowers, the child who plays innocently while in the distance we can hear a man crying out for his life.

The life we enjoy is very much worth the sacrifice.

The visual narrative of The Zone of Interest is the bow, and the sound universe is the arrow. Mica Levi (Under the Skin, Monos) turns her composition into another character in the film. Each note tells us about what the camera does not show us, it is the music that makes us imagine the suffering that is experienced on the other side of the wall. Glazer appears in total control of the staging and its narrative; this is his best film and one in which he shows great maturity in the art of telling stories. As the third act nears its end, the Brit gives us a perfect sequence that summarizes the journey of Rudolf Höss. Just when the Nazi commander has obtained what he so desires, he calls home to share the joy of his achievement. We see him leave an office and walk down a desolate hallway, he prepares to go down some stairs that become increasingly darker, and he stops and looks into the distance where he barely glimpses a bit of light, we are transported to another era for a few moments, and we return to Höss’s descent into absolute darkness.