The Zone of Interest (2023)

A well-to-do German family enjoys the good life in their house full of servants. Their grounds are large with a pool, a greenhouse, and a garden full of both vegetables and beautiful flowers. Dad's work is right next door, so he's able to be present for the family. He often takes the kids out for days on the river, which is within walking distance of the house. Mom regularly receives high-value items her husband is able to score during his workdays (e.g. a fur coat). That the job next door is Auschwitz doesn't hamper their enjoyment in the least. What a powerful juxtaposition. What terrible people. This movie basically sells itself based on the description alone. 

The problem is that the director is in love with affectation and deliberate obfuscation. For example, I had to look up what was going on with the sequences of a girl going out at night to stuff items into dirt; though the explanation was amazing, the film itself didn't bother to enlighten me or to even make it clear what the items were. Also, the movie begins with several minutes of black screen -- I wonder how many people left the theater to complain that there was no picture, because I stopped and restarted the recording in my living room and then had to research whether my stream was defective. The soundtrack is often just loud mechanical groaning that I'm sure was meant to evoke something other than the irritation I felt whenever it'd ramp up. 

In all, it felt like the director didn't want the material to speak for itself. This is like the Mona Lisa being put in a neon orange plastic frame decorated with glow-in-the-dark lightning bolt stickers. The delivery distracted from the compelling subject: the inhabitants of a smug little oasis made possible by their banal inhumanity.

C