Review of Son of Saul (2015) by Steve M — 21 Feb 2016

Son of Saul brings back to life the unimaginable horrors of the Holocaust by telling the story of Saul, a Hungarian Jew part of the Sonderkommando in the Auschwitz death camp. The Sonderkommandos were units of Jews who were forced to work in the gas chambers whose job consisted of getting rid of the corpses that were annihilated in there. This entailed carrying the bodies and then either throwing them into mass graves, or cremating them.

The life of Saul involved doing these horrifying and dehumanizing tasks on a daily basis, until he finds some purpose in life. However, what could someone living in such circumstances choose as a life purpose after witnessing thousands of people perish? Well, he recognizes his son from within a pool of gassed bodies, and he wants to provide a proper Jewish burial. After this, everything else, including his own life, loses priority and is moved to the background, literally speaking (Iâ??ll explain why in a moment). Saulâ??s perseverance toward burying the child conflicts with an impending uprising from within the Sonderkommando units and he needs to prioritize between physical survival and spiritual survival. He needs to decide whether to think of his well-being or whether to be selfless and bring dignity to the early-departed.

Shot in 35mm, with mostly close-ups and meticulously organized long takes, Son of Saul follows Saul exclusively as he risks his life and does everything he can to find a Rabbi who can conduct a Jewish burial in the midst of a life without hope and full of despair. For the most part, we only see Saul, portrayed exceptionally by Géza Röhrig, but in the background, the horrors of the death camps linger. It is worth mentioning how perfect the blocking is for this film, because behind Saul there is an unfathomable amount of things happening. Nevertheless, it is all in the background and, on the whole, they are off-focus. This is what makes Son of Saul a one-of-a-kind film.

We have seen so many films about the Holocaust, and while most of them are really good, they have rarely succeeded in making the stories intimate and cruelly real without being trite and sappy. Son of Saul overcame all of the above, and I believe this happened because of its artistic style. While it is set during the Holocaust, the main plot of the film is not about the Holocaust, itâ??s about a man who wants to find a purpose amid difficult times. He wants to do something worthwhile as his imminent death approaches. He wants to bring some honor to the dead; to his race. This is why we only see the savagery of the death camps in the background, and let me tell you, itâ??s horrifying. Probably even more so than a normal Holocaust film, because in this one it looks so mundane and casual. It was actually portrayed as something that happened for days, months, and even years on end. It was portrayed as something the people in the camps had to get used to. Another factor that is pivotal to making this film as agonizingly real was the sound design. Boy, was it frightening. There is an amalgamation of off-screen and on-screen sounds that is both bone-chilling and horrifying. It is rare to come across a film where the sound design shakes you from your core.

A true revelation in this film is Géza Röhrig, whoâ??s numbness and almost catatonic performance was the one who carried this entire film on his shoulders. This is quite impressive given this is Röhrigâ??s film debut. His portrayal of the desensitization of the horrors of the camps was on-point and raw. Furthermore, you can see in his actions the last remnants of hope fading away. At the end, it is not important if the kid was actually his son or not. He was just a vessel for Saulâ??s last attempt to survive. Itâ??s a shame the Academy did not think of him worthy of a nomination. My compliments to Hungarian director László Nemes who debuted his feature-film directorial career with this harrowing and deeply powerful film. Son of Saul, youâ??ll be remembered.