Sure, Jonathan Glazer’s The Zone of Interest is a distressing movie, but have you read the Wikipedia page on the Höss family? Spoiler: they turned on each other, and at least some of the kids didn’t turn out so great.
A half-formed thought I should probably keep to myself before wondering out loud: I had a preconceived notion of this movie in my head before I saw it, and I was a little… surprised?… at how, shall I say, obvious and unsubtle it turned out to be.
Cineastes tend to think about avoiding spoilers when it comes to mainstream plot-driven fare, but it can apply to the artsy tone poems as well. Marketing and word of mouth might create certain expectations, as to tone if nothing else. I was anticipating a near-wordless depiction of a family doing everyday stuff like eating dinner and washing the dishes, with one of history’s most appalling atrocities just out of frame.
Instead, I was taken aback to find The Zone of Interest quite talky, and for it to veer into pitch-black comedy at times — such as when Hedwig (Sandra Hüller) brags “zey call me der queen of Auschwitz” and then cackles like the Wicked Witch. The Höss family are happy beneficiaries of the newly-available real estate, jobs, social status, and luxury items, and all they have to do is put up with the stench. I’ve read a couple Martin Amis novels (but not this one), so I recognize his propensity for gallows humor. I’m just trying to articulate that I was not led to expect this film to be like that.