Jonathan Glazer Says Holocaust Film ‘Zone of Interest’ Is “Not a Museum Piece”
The film, about the family that lives outside the wall of the Auschwitz concentration camp, will be released by A24.
“You never really know why you tackle any subject. This is not something I planned. It’s an ever-evolving journey. I certainly have had the subject in mind for many years,” said writer-director Glazer, whose works include Sexy Beast, Birth, and Under the Skin, during the film’s press conference. Saying that two years after the release of his last feature Under the Skin he was reading about the Holocaust and eventually visited Auschwitz: “It was a very profound week in our life.
Glazer said that he began to think about the wall that surrounded the camp, saying, “that wall became a manifestation of what we tell ourselves. We compartmentalize for our own convenience.” The filmmaker worked with researchers who went through survivor testimonies, who provided the filmmaker with any mention of the Höss family. Production designer Chris Oddy visited Auschwitz and the Höss home, and did intense archival work, largely limited to black-and-white photos.
The film, which will be released by A24 in the U.S. after its in-competition premiere at Cannes, received a glowing reception at its Cannes premiere, with a long-standing ovation.
Lead actress Sandra Hüller, best known for her role in Toni Erdman, said that playing the role of the wife of a Nazi officer was “never about being good at something or doing something extraordinary. It didn’t have anything to do with ambition at all.” She added: “I never really felt familiar with her but, at the same time, I felt that there was no real way to do it right.”
Glazer was asked about releasing Zone of Interest in the wake of worldwide uptick in antisemitism, neo-Nazism, and white supremacy. “What it’s trying to do is talk to the human capacity for violence, wherever you are from. Just trying to show these people as people and not as monsters was a very important thing to do because the great crime and tragedy is that human beings did this to other human beings,” said the director. “It’s very convenient for us to try to distance ourselves from them but I think we should be less certain than that.”
