Son of Saul
The Grand Prix-winner and the Academy Awards winner Hungarian movie in the Ördögkatlan.
László Nemes-Jeles's movie will be screened in front of the Reconciliation Chapel at Beremend (for free of charge).
The next day, Tamás Zányi, a Béla Balázs Prize-winning sound engineer will be interviewed by Alinda Veiszer.
“Son of Saul is set in the Auschwitz-Birkenau death camp in 1944, and one Hungarian Jewish prisoner named Saul (played by Géza Röhrig) is a member of the Sonderkommando, a group of prisoners given humiliating and illusory privileges as trusties, with minor increases in food ration in return for their carrying the bodies from the gas chambers to pyres to be burned, then carting the ashes away to be dumped. The task is carried out at a frantic, ever-accelerating rate around the clock, as the Allies close in. Among the dead, Saul discovers the body of his young son, and sets out to find a rabbi among the prisoners to give the boy a proper burial in secret, using pleas, threats, blackmail and bribes – with jewellery (called the “shiny”) that he steals from the bodies – to achieve his aim. Saul’s desperate mission is carried out with the same urgent, hoarse whispers and mutterings as another plot in progress: a planned uprising, which Saul’s intentions may upset. And all the time, the Sonderkommando are aware, through this network of whispers, that they themselves will be executed in due course by their Nazi captors.” (Peter Bradshaw’s summary)
Directed by László Nemes
Written by László Nemes, Clara Royer
Cinematography: Mátyás Erdély
Set design: László Rajk
Costume design: Edit Szűcs
Produced by Gábor Sipos & Gábor Rajna
Sound engineer: Tamás Zányi
Edited by Matthieu Taponier
Starring Géza Röhrig
László Nemes-Jeles's movie will be screened in front of the Reconciliation Chapel at Beremend (for free of charge).
The next day, Tamás Zányi, a Béla Balázs Prize-winning sound engineer will be interviewed by Alinda Veiszer.
“Son of Saul is set in the Auschwitz-Birkenau death camp in 1944, and one Hungarian Jewish prisoner named Saul (played by Géza Röhrig) is a member of the Sonderkommando, a group of prisoners given humiliating and illusory privileges as trusties, with minor increases in food ration in return for their carrying the bodies from the gas chambers to pyres to be burned, then carting the ashes away to be dumped. The task is carried out at a frantic, ever-accelerating rate around the clock, as the Allies close in. Among the dead, Saul discovers the body of his young son, and sets out to find a rabbi among the prisoners to give the boy a proper burial in secret, using pleas, threats, blackmail and bribes – with jewellery (called the “shiny”) that he steals from the bodies – to achieve his aim. Saul’s desperate mission is carried out with the same urgent, hoarse whispers and mutterings as another plot in progress: a planned uprising, which Saul’s intentions may upset. And all the time, the Sonderkommando are aware, through this network of whispers, that they themselves will be executed in due course by their Nazi captors.” (Peter Bradshaw’s summary)
Directed by László Nemes
Written by László Nemes, Clara Royer
Cinematography: Mátyás Erdély
Set design: László Rajk
Costume design: Edit Szűcs
Produced by Gábor Sipos & Gábor Rajna
Sound engineer: Tamás Zányi
Edited by Matthieu Taponier
Starring Géza Röhrig