'Son of Saul' - Review

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

Lásló Nemes’ debut feature and winner of the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film is harrowing, tragic and essential. Géza Röhrig occupies the frame as Saul, a member of the Sonderkommando; Jewish prisoners of the German concentration camps forced to assist in the Nazi production line of death. In the process of emptying a gas chamber, he salvages a body that he believes to be his son. The following hours see Saul search the camp for a Rabbi to help properly bury the boy, but his desperate efforts threaten to disrupt an uprising amongst his fellow prisoners.

It is often the case with films about the Holocaust that critics or awards’ voters are accused of being overly generous with their praise purely on the basis of the film’s subject matter, regardless of any technical prowess. Not so here. Son of Saul’s eye is accomplished; delicate and excoriating all at once. The camera (permanently locked to Saul’s gaze or pursuing him) constructs the camp through countenance and the briefly-glimpsed silhouettes of horror all around. Never for one second is Nemes in any danger of creating a spectacle or making a cheap grab for the heartstrings. Any ‘action’ is either implied or delivered by a surround sound experience like no other. Transcending any barrier placed by the German, Hungarian and Polish dialects spoken throughout, the film speaks in the visceral language of suffering. 

Röhrig’s performance is devastating, Saul's pallid visage hewn from rock but moulded by hell, passing almost inscrutably from the steadfast granite of resolution to the soft ache of despair. The consistent restraint is entirely appropriate (a single misstep could lead Saul and his companions to death or worse), allowing the final moments to find a last gasp of humanity through the most miniscule yet recognisable of movements. It seems bizarre to employ such a phrase with regard to an event so utterly distressing, but there is something beautifully life-affirming to be found amongst the ashes: a newfound appreciation for life itself. Such a description hints at eventual catharsis, but you’ll be too disturbed to cry. 

Son of Saul truly deserves every plaudit bestowed upon it not only as an engrossing drama, an affecting depiction of tragedy and an astonishing first feature, but also as a demonstration of why we need cinema: if we refuse to confront the unspeakable on-screen, how can we ever hope to face it in reality?