SAUL FIA/ SON OF SAUL

Hungary, 2015, 107 minutes, Colour.
Geza Rohrig.
Directed by Laszlo Nemes.

Son of Saul is demanding viewing. This is a Hungarian film, set in Auschwitz 1944, life in the concentration camps, Jewish prisoners, questions of survival but also questions of human values and Jewish traditions.

The film won many awards, in Cannes 2015, Golden Globe award for Best Foreign Language Film and then the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film.

A number of audiences found the film to gruelling to watch, some having to leave the cinema because they found it. However, over the decades, Holocaust stories and concentration camps stories have been continual reminders that the memory must not be lost.

Saul and many of the other men in the camp are considered as sonderkommanders, indispensable for work, especially in preparing those who are to go into the gas chambers (being cajoled by voices coming through speakers saying that they would be given soup) but who are being asked to strip, leave their clothes and their valuables behind and then being locked into the chambers. The men have to collect the clothes, classify them, examine possessions, even to the gold in teeth.

But, these sonderkommanders are also dispensable, ready to be executed after they have served their time in working.

With the focus on Saul, the film is able to bring some humanity into this inhumane situation. Saul finds a young man who has not finished dying, is moved by his plight, sees him as something of a son-figure and treating him with some reverence, wanting to find a Rabbi to provide some kind of closing ritual for this man’s life, concealing him from the authorities while he tries to fulfil the rituals.

This is difficult as he enlists the help of the Jewish doctor who conducts autopsies, has to avoid the criticisms of some of the other prisoners and sonderkommanders, the audience becoming more involved in the character of Saul and this humane quest.

The visual style of the film is quite stark, sometimes not clear, simply immersing its audience in this dark and confused and confusing world.

The film builds up its tension, especially when the prisoners have planned an escape, involving Saul in making contact with a source for explosives that they would use to create a diversion so that they may make a run. And Saul finds a Rabbi whom he brings to the body of the young man.

But, this is a sombre story and the plotline would not necessarily go as the escapees have planned, not for Saul, not for the body of the boy, not for the role of the Rabbi, not to the escapees – which, after harrowing action, means that audiences will leave the theatre, feeling that they have been put through harrowing experiences, the vision of the boy in the woods as they escape, the oncoming German soldiers, sombre experiences, and an acknowledgement that in inhumanity there is humanity – but, as the concentration camps showed, humanity does not always conquer.



1. The impact of the film? Nominations and awards? Holocaust story for the 21st century?

2. The Hungarian perspective? Hungary and its war experience, the Jews, prisoners of war, Auschwitz, deaths?

3. The locations, the unsaturated colour, the interiors of the death rooms, the exteriors of, lineups, workplaces, the autopsy room, the quarters for the prisoners, massacre and the uprising? The forest? The minimal musical score?

4. The unusual visual style? Saul emerging out of focus, then the focus on him, the first three lengthy shots, all on Saul, his face, his back, the action and deaths around him, yet all from his limited point of view? The particular commandants among the prisoners in the camp, the initial information, then work, ultimate execution? The work, collecting the clothes, the valuables, scrubbing the floor, the minimal words? Reliance on body language and expression?

5. The extensive action, but always from the point of view of Saul or from behind him, beside him? Everything from Saul’s experience and its limits, uncertainty and confusion? The whole film? The effect on the audience and their identification with Saul, his experiences, motivations, suffering?

6. The prisoners, Jewish, the internment, the camp? The German authorities, the use of the German language, translators Hungarians? The German commanders, the officers, the doctors? The brutal mentality?

7. The rounding up of the quota for execution, telling the people lies, talk about work, the hot soup, getting them to strip, herded together, into the room, the locked doors, the screams, the carrying of the bodies away, the collection of the clothes, valuables, scrubbing, the heaps of ashes and carting away?

8. The boy surviving the death room? The title of the film and its relationship to him? Saul’s real son or his imagined son? His wanting a son? His friends saying that he never had a son? His saying that it was not his wife’s? Saul’s explanations? The doctor, the autopsy, Saul‘s request not to cut him? Giving him motivation, care, the search for a rabbi, hiding the body, washing, carrying it, digging the grave, the uprising, his carrying the body, the false Rabbi, digging by the river, the false Rabbi running away, the detail of the crossing the river with the body, losing it, his rescue, hiding, trying to make contact and escape? The little boy at the door? Real? A symbol?

9. The Kapo, work, working with the Germans, with the other prisoners, the plans, the revolt, other prisoners, Saul going to see the girl, getting the powder, the plan for the explosion, the massacre at the river, the confusion, Saul and his losing the powder?

10. The variety of workers, the jobs, clothes, searching, gold, possessions, hiding possessions in shoes, the exchange, the pressures?

11. The doctor, saving the body?

12. The rabbis, the false Rabbi, Saul wanting rituals and prayer?

13. The crowds, lining up to go into the death rooms, the repeats of the executions?

14. The group, the escape, Saul rescued, in the hut?

15. The little boy, a vision for Saul, his going away, the encounter with the soldiers, Saul and his smile? The sounds of the soldiers and the massacre of the prisoners?

16. The story of the Holocaust, 20th century suffering, the cinema experience for younger generations?