Maximilian Weiss

The underlying narrative of a portrait of the family Höss, living in breathtaking oblivion right next to the camp has to be seen to be believed.I wish the film would have focused on this unfathomable ignorance and maybe included the entire village, the neighbours etc. The idea to exclude the inside of the camp is brilliant, it adds to the tension and also it makes sense, one can presume the family has never been inside either. The gruesome sound of gunshots and guards shouting at inmates in the background, all the while the family lives a almost normal and detached life just a few metres away is chilling to the bone. I personally did not really understand the dreamlike sequences nor found them helpful. I also did not get the brief jump to women cleaning the exhibition and ovens. I did not like the music, I would have preferred to let the viewer in the story, in the lives of the family.

Wes Anderson is a genius, but this movie seems like a pointless visual firework with no real plot or purpose. The stellar cast is an over-kill, unable to break out of their mostly plain and unmoving characters. Fittingly, the music bored me as well.