Son of Saul (2015)

So much average

Save your money for something good and enjoyable

Pretty good movie overall. First half was nothing special but it got better as it went along.

The performances transcend the film's tropes, grounding it in characters that feel more complete than this subgenre often produces.

Son of Saul blew me away in so many respects. This is quite an unusual film in so many ways, from the direction to the unique and successful way it delivers emotions. It tells a simple story, but anyone will realize how powerful it is by simply reading the synopsis.The one thing that first struck me about this film is Géza Röhrig 's performance as Saul. Given that this story unfolds in Auschwitz and all the horrors that are being depicted, emotions are delivered in quite a subtle manner, on one hand picturing the main character as a man carrying heavy emotional baggage, and on the other showing some surprising inner strength, fostered by his newfound quest of morally surviving by burying the body of a dead boy. László Nemes' direction is quite unique, as it consists of pretty close shots of the protagonist with everything surrounding him out of focus, leaving some of the horrors to the imagination at times, and creating a tense, hellish atmosphere in other scenes - always maintaining this emotional intimacy between the audience and Saul. Had Röhrig not been as stellar as he was, this could have been quite heavy - and borderline unwatchable. Honestly, this was quite a gamble - but the audacity paid off.You will not hear any music throughout the entire film. Again, I felt like it added to the subtlety in the delivery of emotions, as it never dictates how the viewer should feel - leaving Saul as the only true vehicle of emotion. Instead, with everything but the protagonist out of focus, the sound (which is very well executed) complements the blurry background and brings it to life in all its chaos, tension and horror. You don't always clearly see what is happening around Saul, but you certainly hear and feel it with him.The ending alone makes it worth watching the entire film. It is brilliant and it brought me to tears - not because it's sad, but because I was brought there emotionally through this entire experience, which culminates with a truly moving and beautiful moment. Very highly recommended.

I won't spend too much time on this review other than to say that, with an IMDb rating of 7.5, I expected a much better movie.I quite understand why the director invested so much time and effort in trying to engage the viewer in the main character's view of the atrocity that must have been life in one of the Germans' extermination camps during WWII. The message was conveyed loud and clear that survival for Saul and those like him was a minute by minute matter. Alive this minute and with a bullet in the brain the next if he even looked at one of the SS Officers or guards.Having said that I understand the reasons for trying to engage the audience by use of very unusual cinematography, I must say that I found the idea of looking at the back of Saul's head for almost the entire length of the movie, with everything else around him being thrown out of focus was, after about ten minutes, not only distracting but also extremely annoying. Of course there's a morbid fascination even these days at what the Nazis did during WWII, and it is true that we've seen similar movies made many times over the years. But rarely has a movie on this subject been so annoying and ultimately unsatisfying.I wanted to like this movie "Son Of Saul" but I just couldn't forgive it the infuriating lack of focus on the events that were going on around Saul, rather than on the back of his head and its small and insignificant place in the camp.JMV

It made me think of "Schindler's List"(1993) but this "Son of Saul"(2015) is different. It's as good as Spielberg's film, maybe even better. Love for your own child, even dead, makes you do unusual things, to defy death that awaits for you anyway, inside or off the concentration camp. A film excellently played, filmed, directed.

I set myself a target every year to watch every single film that wins and gets nominated at the Oscars, I had watched the other four nominees in the Foreign Language category, I saved this Hungarian film, the winner, until last. Basically set during the Second World War, Hungarian-Jewish Saul Ausländer (Géza Röhrig) is a prisoner in the Nazi extermination camp at Auschwitz, he a member of Sonderkommando, forced under pain of death to aid with the disposal of gas chamber victims. Saul and the other members know that the prisoners they are enclosing in showers are going to their deaths, the members' work consists of disinfecting the gas chamber after use, going through victims' personal possessions to find valuable items, and disposing of the ashes after the bodies have been burned. One of these gassings however sees Saul pulling out the body of a boy he is convinced is his son, the Germans want to perform an autopsy on the body, but Saul manages to steal the body and avoid this happening. Saul wants to give his son's corpse a proper Jewish burial, he is looking for a Jewish rabbi to preside over the burial, he tells other worker prisoners what he is doing in the hope that they will assist him. Saul finds out that many of the worker prisoners are trying to smuggle out information about the atrocities of the camp to show the world, in order to begin an uprising against their captors. The other Sonderkommando members see their task as more important, and there are many moments when Saul may get stalled or caught, including in the indoor and outdoor crowds of other prisoners, but then there comes a point when the usefulness of the working prisoners for the captors may be coming to an end. A riot breaks out, S-S guards are attacked and the rebellion starts, Saul and a group of prisoners are able to escape, he carries the body of his boy, but he is forced to let it go in the current of the river. In the end Saul and the prisoners find a shed in the forest, they rest to discuss a plan to join the Polish resistance, Saul notices a young peasant boy outside, they smile at each other, the boy runs away and guards pass him, in the direction of the shed, gunfire echoes through the woods and the boy walks away. Also starring Levente Molnár as Abraham Warszawski, Urs Rechn as Oberkapo Biederman, Jerzy Walczak as Rabbi Frankel, Sándor Zsótér as Dr. Miklos Nyiszli, Marcin Czarnik as Feigenbaum, and twins Gergö and Balázs Farkas as Saul's Son. It has been seventy years since the events of the Holocaust, Life Is Beautiful and The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas are examples of films that have successful made a fictional but realistic story using a concentration camp, this film proves that there is still room for a new film about this subject. It is simply watching the life of a working prisoner of Auschwitz over a two day period, but what makes this film really clever is that we only see what the character sees, the shocking exterminations and hundreds of people confined and suffering seen from the point of view of the lead character is much more powerful, it is intense and harrowing, but a respectful and magnificent wartime drama. It won the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film of the Year, it won the BAFTA for Best Film not in the English Language, and it won the Golden Globe for Best Motion Picture - Foreign Language. Very good!