I was tempted to make this review my shortest one yet at only five words long: “You must see this film.” Words can only go so far when describing Jonathan Glazer’s hauntingly grim immersive experience, The Zone of Interest. Winner of the Grand Prix at the 2023 Cannes Film Festival, this Holocaust-set drama is a chilling portrayal of history’s most atrocious cruelties. If you’re like me, it will leave you speechless.

Based on the biographical novel by Martin Amis, The Zone of Interest views the devastating events of the Holocaust from the perspective of a German militia family. The phrase “Zone of Interest” was commonly used by the Nazi SS to describe the small area immediately surrounding the Auschwitz concentration camp. And it’s here where this film takes place.

The commandant of Auschwitz, Rudolf Höss (Christian Friedel), and his wife Hedwig (Sandra Hüller), attempt to build a dream life for their family despite being surrounded by the consistent sounds of suffering and death. Their picturesque home and luscious garden lay in stark contrast to the concentration camp that borders their property. As much as Hedwig and her young children seem to easily drown out the sounds of gunshots, crying, and screaming, we as viewers know that there is no escaping the horrors that are taking place behind the walls. Inside the family’s home is a haven; but step one foot outside, and it’s hell.

When Rudolf is informed that his superiors want him to move to a different city, Hedwig is beside herself. She refuses to leave the beautiful home she made for herself and, for a while, their marriage is only barely surviving. Rudolf views his responsibilities as a death camp commandment with the utmost respect and obeys his orders, taking this new position as an opportunity to better provide for his family. It’s a morality mind warp, as on one hand, Rudolf cares so little about human life that he is actively encouraging mass genocide. On the other, he sacrifices everything to give his family the best life he possibly can. As a viewer, confronting guilt, conflict, and humanity comes in unpredictable, emotional waves.

Witnessing the atrocities of the Holocaust from a perspective we don’t often see–that of the Germans–is one of the reasons why The Zone of Interest is such an uncomfortable watch. There reaches a point where the screams from behind the concentration camp walls become almost ambient, like a horrific yet subtle soundtrack that plays in perpetuity. Adding to the discomfort is the intentional lack of any musical score. Composer Mica Levy (Under the Skin, Monos) contributed ambient-heavy, noise-distorted sound to aid in the opening and end credit roll, but aside from those two moments, there is no additional music. Instead, sound designer Johnnie Burn is heavily relied upon to craft a sensational auditory world that runs concurrently with what is playing onscreen.

Capturing the nuances and complexities in stunning detail is cinematographer Łukasz Żal (Ida, Cold War, I’m Thinking of Ending Things). True to form, Żal’s compositions are masterfully composed, even with Glazer’s unconventional production technique. Fixed and partially hidden cameras were placed around the entire family house, and the actors were required to perform long, unbroken takes, never knowing which moments would be used in the final edit. Due to the nature of the shoot, Friedel and Hüller were tasked with improvising some scenes while others were carefully scripted.

For most of the production, Glazer and Żal watched the scene play out through monitors while stationed in a separate concrete bunker with a team of focus pullers working via a system of remote cables. Says Glazer: “The phrase I kept using was ‘Big Brother in the Nazi house.’ We couldn’t do that, of course, but it was more like the feeling of ‘Let’s watch people in their day-to-day lives.’ I wanted to capture the contrast between somebody pouring a cup of coffee in their kitchen and somebody being murdered on the other side of the wall, the co-existence of those two extremes.”

The performances from Christian Friedel and Sandra Hüller as stiff and detached protagonists are among the year’s best. They keep the audience at arm’s length, and their vacant eyes say more than any words could. Psychologically mystifying, the duality of playing a character with human emotions, yet seemingly devoid of apathy, is a fine line to walk. Yet Friedel and Hüller walk it with a stark, horrifying precision.

The Zone of Interest is, at its core, a rather simple story about one Nazi family’s existence and contributions to one of the worst events in human history. It’s a difficult film to witness and an even more difficult one to forget.