Review of Son of Saul (2015) by Chiek E — 06 Aug 2016

Stunning masterpiece from Hungary. Holocaust as the subject matter in any film is always heart breaking and extremely difficult to watch, not least Son of Saul. Seeing the Nazi death camps for Jews under a new light from the eyes of members of Sonderkommando in the most infamous nazi extermination camp - The Auschwitz death camp in Poland.

These were workers recruited amongst fellow Jews to carry out menial tasks including dehumanizing death duties like ushering fellow Jews into the gas chambers, hauling corpses to the incinerator and dumping their ashes unceremoniously in the woods or lake.

The film focused on one Sonderkommando member, a Hungarian Jew named Saul, who must witness the atrocity of his illegitimate son´s murder and experience the excruciating agony and sadness of his incapacity to rescue his son.

Gassed unsuccessfully the first time but must suffocate again under the brutal hands of a German soldier. Resolved not to let his son´s body incinerate, the film described Saul's almost manic desperation to find a Rabbi amongst the hordes of human traffic and then smuggle the body out of the camp to give his son a proper Jewish burial.

The film ended with extreme sadness because Saul lost his son´s body while crossing the river and he was caught and gunned down by the German search party shortly after. A stark contrast to the ending in Schindler´s list where there was a hero and there was a happy ending because some Jewish lives were saved.

In Son of Saul, we do have Saul as a different kind of hero who displayed superhuman and desperate resolve to bring peace to his son´s soul. Unlike the usual Hollywood formula, there was no heart moving music scores and there was no happy ending.

Which should be way because, there are no happy endings to movies about the holocaust. And I love European made films.