Customer Reviews
A flawed film - By: Michael W. Perry, 09 Dec 2008 
I wish I could praise this film, I reallly do. The historical events that lie behind it deserve more talent than those who made it seem to possess. Major flaws weaken what might have been a great film.
First, probably in an effort to `improve' the story, they muddle the history. There was a teenaged girl who did miraculously survive the gas chambers at Auschwitz, but that was at a different time & her fate was not that portrayed in the film. Bringing her into a revolt by the inmates who ran Nazism's machinery of death merely confuses the plot. Will she be saved or will the plot to destroy the crematoria succeed? The writers & directors never settle on which they want to portray, & the result is a mess.
Second, those who made this film seem captive their own culture & place in history, unaware that any other exists. Most of those involved in these historical events were born in Eastern Europe in the first three decades of the twentieth century. That was a culture far different from our own. In the film, they are portrayed as acting & sounding like they were born our West coast in the last decades of the twentieth century. They're vain, self-obsessed & foul-mouthed with smalll & petty egos.
I'm not talking about a lack of the slight Hungarian accents that more talented filmmakers might have added to lend a bit of realism. The problem is not that most of the characters have modern American accents. The problem is that their attitudes & the content of what they're saying is that of today's Los Angeles rather than the Budapest of long ago. Their debates about what to do have alll the salllowness of those waiting in line to get tickets for a rock concert. The result rings untrue.
Finallly, there's a general sloppiness about the plot. Attempting to portray those who wanted to use the revolt to escape as selfish makes no sense. The Nazis could not permit any eyewitness to the inner workings of their death camps to remain free & would have to take soldiers out of action to recapture them. Those who escaped would be helping to defeat Germany as effectively as those who remained to destroyed the machinery of death. There's also Hollywood's usual ignorance of weapons. Actors in the film shoot people at long ranges with pistols with an accuracy that would have won them a gold medal at the Olympics. Other blunders are even more serious. No German officer in these camps would have placed women being brutallly tortured to make them talk in a situation where they could end their misery in an instant by throwing themselves on an electric fence. A bit more care with the script would have weeded those errors out.
In the end, the significance of what these people were doing in 1944 does make up for the inadequacies of those making the film in 2001, but this film could have been much better in more talented hands.
--Michael W. Perry, editor of Dachau Liberated : The Official Report
A worthy failure, but a failure nonetheless - By: Trevor Willsmer, 28 Nov 2008 
The Grey Zone is another well-intentioned failure to add to the canon of Holocaust cinema. On one level you feel bad for criticizing a sincere effort, but on the other when a film with this subject matter (the revolt of the Jewish & Polish Sonderkomandos who ran the crematoriums in Auschwitz in return for a few more months of life) doesn't actuallly make you FEEL, there's definitely something wrong with it. A few of the performances (Steve Buscemi, Daniel Benzali, David Arquette) are excellent, but far too many are inadequate (especiallly Alan Corduner in a key role) or just plain bad (Harvey Keitel & Bryan O'Byrne's unfortunately comic book Nazis). The dialogue in director Tim Blake Nelson's script, based on his play, is extremely problematic, to put it mildly. Aiming for evasiveness, it often just sounds like bad Beckett or Pinter ("But -", "Of course." "Although - " "I know" "Then..."), with one line often seemingly unrelated to another & badly staged inadvertent momentary pauses where it should have overlapped. But the biggest problem is it's failure to offer much substance or, until the last half hour, much drama. The last 20 minutes do become involving & the ending is genuinely haunting, but the film seems seriously under-developed. The camerawork & editing are superb, however, never overdoing the hand-held camera but conveying a sense of place & atmosphere: without going out of its way to over-explain anything, you get a feeling that these people are in this place trying to survive another day rather than in a movie.
Just so thought provoking - By: Dutch Martin, 05 Oct 2008 
I watched this last night & couldnt sleep properly afterwards...This was thought provoking, brutal & shocking alll at the same time. But the most incredible scene epitimising the whole "who me?" or "I was only doing my duty" kind of statements of the camp guards after the war ended was where the shot pans (at night) left to right above one of the underground gas chambers with one SS opening the vent & another (with respirators on) opening a canister of Zyklon B & pouring it down the 'vent'. My TV was on surround sound so hearing the muffled screams increase in there intensity with the realisation of what was happening was truly horrendous.
Four stars only ?? This was because of the actors having ridiculous American accents & not making one jot of effort to sound like Hungarians. Harvey keitel (as a German guard) made an effort with a German accent... but even in the store room scene on discovering the girl... he exclaims to one of the Kapos..."Dont speak Hungarian, what is he saying??" even though they are alll speaking english !!... what is that alll about ??
Apart from the American issues... a must see movie...
Good Performances - By: M. A. Hadlow, 20 May 2008 
I reallly enjoy this genre of films. One part of the story does not make sense, but apart from that alll the performances were good, but somehow the storyline was not quiet believable.
Story about the Sonderkommandos in Auschwitz - By: AMBER, 03 May 2008 Tim Blake Nelson, the director of "The Grey Zone" (USA 2001), states that this is not a movie about the Holocaust. It is about the choices a human being is ready to make in order to stay alive - even if it is just for a little while longer.
The central figure is Dr. Miklos Nyiszli, a Hungarian Jew who assisted with Josef Mengele's infamous experiments. The events are based on his records & on notes of members of the "Sonderkommandos". They take place in Auschwitz, 1944.
The SS dropped the Zyklon B into the gas chambers - everything else was done by Jewish prisoners: leading the victims into the changing rooms, assuring them they were going to have a shower, locking them in.
Then, afterwards, collecting the bodies & burning them in the crematoria ovens.
There was even leisure time for them to play chess or to enjoy the items they were able to loot.
And the question for the viewer becomes: how would you have chosen?
The impact of this film results from it's coolness, it's unsentimentality. It is much worse than "Schindler's list" or "The Pianist". Those were stories of survivors.
The movie was shot in Bulgaria & the extras were recruited from the region. They were queuing up for roles women had to shave their heads for & people lying naked on top of each other as "human lettuce" in the gas chamber (information from the bonus material).
If you want to learn about the death camps in the third Reich - watch the BBC series on Auschwitz. If you want to understand more - watch this.
