​FILMS

son of saul

The fall of Saul.

2016 review number 37:

Son of Saul: (Drama): 70 out of 100: Paul Byrnes, film critic for The Sydney Morning Herald, wrote "It is one of the greatest films ever made." You could say that my expectations were extremely high going into the cinema, not only because of this quote, but also due to all the accolades it has been receiving. The recipient of this year's Oscar for Best Foreign Film is not one of the greatest films ever made...it's not even one of the greatest Holocaust films ever made. Frankly, it's a solid drama that is not as moving as it should be, given the oppressing subject matter.

 

Saul Ausländer (Géza Röhrig) is a Hungarian-Jewish prisoner in Auschwitz. He works as a Sonderkommando member, burning the dead. Sonderkommandos were work units made up of German Nazi death camp prisoners during the Holocaust in World War II. One day, he finds the body of a boy he believes is his son. His corpse is scheduled for an autopsy because he was still breathing after exiting the gas chambers. Saul desires dignity for his 'son' and pleads with prison doctor, Miklós (Sándor Zsótér) not to conduct the autopsy so he can locate a rabbi to give him a proper Jewish burial.

 

The majority of the movie follows Saul around the concentration camp with plenty of time spent in the gas chambers. The technique the director adopts (László Nemes making his feature film debut) is to have the camera up close to Saul following his every move. There are occasions when it seems like a camera is perched on his shoulder. Quite a few of the scenes in the gas chamber are out of focus so the story is primarily about him. This creates a distancing effect in that we don't become fully emotional when the prisoners are executed. 

 

There's no doubt that Röhrig is able to demonstrate his feelings with his expressions. With the camera so close to him, we feel more sympathy for him than the people surrounding him. One scene that is particularly harrowing involves Saul being targeted for death while we see other prisoners being shot at point blank range. As a result of the first person account, we see many of the incidents unravel before Saul's eyes.

 

It is obvious that meticulous planning has gone into the making of this film. There are long takes which require the camera to negotiate its way around the gas chamber and concentration camp. What makes this even more realistic is there is no music until the credits roll. It certainly generates an eerie effect but at the same time, captures the mood that the prisoners would have experienced.

 

Son of Saul isn't the masterpiece I was expecting due to the distancing effect of the cameras. I understand that this technique was employed to create a first person view of the horrific events of the Holocaust but I felt it went overboard. Nevertheless, this is still an interesting account of a time which still generates pain and heartache for people of today.

 

Starring Géza Röhrig, Levente Molnár and Urs Rechn

(107 mins)

Parental advice: Violence, adult themes and nudity

Additional scene during or after credits: No

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uh2toNTE7rA (Movie trailer)

 

(Reviewed on Saturday 27th February, 2016)

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