From the outset, I imagined this movie as a way to plunge the viewer into a personal labyrinth, along Irisz’s quest to find her brother and ultimately the meaning of the world she wants to discover. Unlike Son of Saul, which had a meticulous documentary-style approach, Sunset resembles a tale, a mystery in itself where the viewer is invited on this journey to find, along with the main character, a possible way through this maze of facades and layers. Probably under the influence of a certain literary and cinematographic tradition of Central Europe, I’ve been drawn to a main character that is partly surrounded by mystery and whose actions the audience has to assess and re-assess continuously, even becoming at some point a figure of an unexpected dimension, like a strange Joan of Arc of Middle Europe. They were about to take all the people, unsuspecting and believing in progress, into a quagmire and destruction of hitherto unseen, industrial proportions.Įven before starting my first feature Son of Saul, I had in mind the idea of making a film about a woman, alone, lost in her world, a world she tries but ultimately fails to understand. But under the veneer of civilization, many forces could not be controlled. This society, whose codes and sophistication were embodied by the way people dressed and behaved - the hats they designed and wore, preserved a facade of tranquility. In a way, beyond the love for technology within society and its boundless optimism, there was a deep malaise – a floating sentiment that something ominous, possibly apocalyptic was about to happen. The identity crisis resulting from the fragmentation of aspirations and the decay of the central royal order, coupled with general sense of disenchantment and a crisis of masculinity, give rise to a vibrating world that was on the verge of ecstatic prosperity or its downfall. Thus, many fundamentally marginal, albeit enthusiastic movements co-exist in Austria- Hungary, where all art forms, including architecture, literature and motion pictures, flourished. New scientific approaches blossom, the first forms of psychological studies and psychoanalysis thrive, whereas many pseudo-scientific and intellectual groups, cult-like movements (occult sects following illuminated leaders) seemed to crave a special place in society, or on the edge of society. Modern antisemitism reaches its maturity in Vienna. All forms of vigorous political and ideological aspirations that spread during the 19th century were present, even rampant, sometimes mixed: socialism, anarchism, nationalism. Politically, the old Franz Joseph, Emperor of Austria and King of Hungary, ruled from Vienna, over vast territories, including a dozen nations and many cultures and religions. Visceral, gripping and immensely powerful, it is one of the boldest and most remarkable debut features in recent memory and is already being heralded as a masterpiece of world cinema.Just before the outbreak of World War I, the monarchy of Austria-Hungary was in the very center of Europe, a crossroads of all the accumulated European tensions, where modernity and obsolescence co-existed on many levels. Anchored by a riveting and intensely brave performance from newcomer Géza Röhrig, Son of Saul is a remarkable exploration of one of humanity’s darkest moments. As the Sonderkommando plan a rebellion, Saul vows to carry out an impossible task: to save the child's body from the flames and to find a rabbi to recite the mourner’s Kaddish and offer the boy a proper burial. While at work, he discovers the body of a boy he recognises as his son. Saul Ausländer is a member of the Sonderkommando, the Jewish prisoners forced to assist in the machinery of the Nazi concentration camps. Winner of the Grand Prix at Cannes 2015, a Golden Globe, and frontrunner for this year’s Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film, Son of Saul is Hungarian director László Nemes’ blistering debut feature a courageous and unflinching reimagining of the Holocaust drama.
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