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The Grey Zone - October 18, 2002 Written & Directed By Tim Blake Nelson |
 Toronto International Film Festival Premiere Distributed by Lions Gate Films
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Holocaust Horrorsby Liz SmithOctober 13, 2002 'I could a tale unfold whose lightest word would harrow up thy soul, freeze thy young blood," Hamlet says. Do you think films such as "Schindler's List" and "Playing for Time" revealed all the horror a movie can convey about the Holocaust? Wrong. Coming soon is Tim Blake Nelson's "The Grey Zone." Nothing I can say about this film will prepare you. Set in Auschwitz, it is based on actual events - the only uprising of concentration camp victims against the Nazis. What sets "The Grey Zone" apart and makes it so controversial is its focus on Jews selected to assist in the extermination process. They lead the doomed into the gas chambers, persuade them to strip for "a shower," pull gold from the mouths of the dead and deliver corpses to the ovens. For these labors, the Sonderkommandos, as they were called, were fed, reasonably treated, given more months of life- until they, too, were killed. This is harrowing cinema. I've never seen a film in which the horror of the death camps has been so graphically and matter-of-factly presented. There's no soundtrack to dramatize or sentimentalize. The camera is cold, clinically invasive, brutal. "The Grey Zone," with its tale of a desperate, ill-conceived plot to rebel, offers a critical subplot involving a girl, 13, who miraculously survives the gas chamber. This child, nearly comatose from her experience, becomes a symbol of life to doomed men whose basest instincts are to live just one more day. There is great acting from Steve Buscemi, Harvey Keitel, Daniel Benzali, Allan Corduner, Mira Sorvino, Natasha Lyonne. I tip my hat particularly to David Arquette, best known as a goofball in a series of dumb and dumber comedies and as a recurring character in the "Scream" slasher movies. Here, in a story of true terror, he is pressed to convey deeper, darker feelings and acquits himself beautifully. Good for director Nelson for taking a chance on Arquette. By the time "The Grey Zone" fades to black, people will be stunned into remembering how much evil existed before Sept. 11. I was chilled anew with the realization this mass, organized attempt to exterminate an entire race happened 60- odd years ago in what we thought was a supremely civilized part of Europe.
'Zone,' Keitel, Buscemi to Kick Off Stony Brook FestivalBy Peter GoodmanJune 3, 2002 This year's Stony Brook Film Festival, the seventh annual, opens July 17 with the first East Coast showing of the star-studded, morally conflicted "The Grey Zone," which focuses on the Auschwitz sonderkommando, a unit of Jews at the death camp forced by the Nazis to help exterminate Jews. The film opened briefly in Los Angeles just after Sept. 11; its ultimate release has been pushed back to next fall. Harvey Keitel, who plays the doctor on whose memoir the movie is based, is to be in Stony Brook opening night, along with writer-director Tim Blake Nelson, to introduce and, later, answer questions about the movie. Keitel has assured Staller Center director Alan Inkles that he will be there because of the subject matter and his deep involvement in the film. Keitel heads a cast that includes David Arquette, Steve Buscemi, Mira Sorvino and Daniel Benzali. This year's festival, which runs for 11 days, through July 27, includes four other regional premieres, as well as 30 features and short films competing for awards voted on both by a jury and the audience. Several were made on or about Long Island, or include Islanders in the creative and production teams. The premieres include "The Weight of Water," a dramatic thriller with Sean Penn and Elizabeth Hurley (July 18); "Bark," about a woman who decides she's a dog, with Heather Morgan, Lee Tergesen, Lisa Kudrow, Hank Azaria and Vincent D'Onofrio (July 23); "The Jimmy Show," a black comedy written and directed by star Frank Whaley, with Carla Gugino and Ethan Hawke (July 26), and "Pursuit of Happiness," a romantic comedy directed by John Putch, with Frank Whaley (again) and Annabeth Gish, closing the festival on July 27. The films with local connections are "Mergers and Acquisitions" (July 19), shot partly in Huntington and Syosset; "Returning Mickey Stern" (July 22), shot on Fire Island; and "The Blue Lizard" (July 26), by Stony Brook alumnus Fred Carpenter, which is about and was shot at the Blue Lizard Lounge in Commack and the university campus. Festival passes, admission to all films and panels, are $40; $10 additional for the closing night awards celebration. Call 631-632- ARTS; online at www.stonybrookfilmfestival.com. Copyright © 2002, Newsday, Inc.
Based on actual events, THE GREY ZONE is the staggeringly powerful story of the Auschwitz's twelfth Sonderkommando - one of the thirteen consecutive 'Special Squads' of Jewish prisoners placed by the Nazis in the excruciating moral dilemma of helping to exterminate fellow Jews in exchange for a few more months of life. As written and directed by Tim Blake Nelson, and performed by a first rate ensemble cast including Steve Buscemi, Davis Arquette, Harvey Keitel, Mira Sorvino and Natasha Lyonne, this film chronicles the Sonderkommando's struggle to organize the only armed revolt that would ever take place at Auschwitz. As the rebellion is about to commence, a group from the unit discovers a fourteen-year-old girl who has miraculously survived a gassing. A catalyst for their desperate attempt at personal redemption, the men become obsessed with saving this one child even as doing so endangers the uprising which could save thousands. From inside the working organs of the infamous Auschwitz death camp, this film asks to what terrible lengths we are willing to go to save our own lives, and what in turn we would sacrifice to save the lives of others.
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Schlermer ..... Daniel Benzali