To work on The Zone of Interest, Jonathan Glazer’s harrowing Holocaust drama about the domestic life of an Auschwitz commandant and his family, Polish cinematographer Lukasz Zal had to “forget everything I was taught” about making “beautiful images.”
Glazer’s film, loosely adapted from the 2014 novel of the same name by Martin Amis, follows the seemingly mundane activities of Auschwitz commandant Rudolf Höss, and his wife Hedwig, played by Christian Friedl and Sandra Hüller, as they strive to build a dream life for their family in their house and garden next to the camp. The smooth, stunning monochrome aesthetic Zal perfected on his (Oscar-nominated) lensing of Pawel Pawlikowski’s Ida and Cold War would not do for Glazer’s story, which aimed to evoke the banality of evil by refusing to show Höss and Hedwig as anything but what they were: Ordinary, even boring, people who carried out unspeakable evil.
Glazer’s film, loosely adapted from the 2014 novel of the same name by Martin Amis, follows the seemingly mundane activities of Auschwitz commandant Rudolf Höss, and his wife Hedwig, played by Christian Friedl and Sandra Hüller, as they strive to build a dream life for their family in their house and garden next to the camp. The smooth, stunning monochrome aesthetic Zal perfected on his (Oscar-nominated) lensing of Pawel Pawlikowski’s Ida and Cold War would not do for Glazer’s story, which aimed to evoke the banality of evil by refusing to show Höss and Hedwig as anything but what they were: Ordinary, even boring, people who carried out unspeakable evil.
- 11/15/2023
- by Scott Roxborough
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
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