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  • 2019 Films
    • 4 Stars >
      • A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood
      • For Sama
      • Jojo Rabbit
      • Once Upon a Time ... in Hollywood
    • 3.5 Stars >
      • Alita: Battle Angel
      • Blinded by the Light
      • Booksmart
      • John Wick: Chapter 3 - Parabellum
      • Joker
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      • Midnight Traveler
      • Mike Wallace Is Here
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    • 3 Stars >
      • Ash is the Purest White
      • Avengers: Endgame
      • Brittany Runs A Marathon
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      • The Dead Don't Die
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      • Gloria Bell
      • Good Boys
      • The Hummingbird Project
      • The Kid Who Would Be King
      • Knock Down the House
      • Meeting Gorbachev
      • Queen & Slim
      • Ready or Not
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      • Us
      • Velvet Buzzsaw
    • 2.5 Stars >
      • All Is True
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      • How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World
      • Hustlers
      • It Chapter Two
      • The LEGO Movie 2: The Second Part
      • The Lion King
      • Long Day's Journey Into Night
      • Non-Fiction
      • Official Secrets
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      • Richard Jewell
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      • Where's My Roy Cohn?
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      • Yesterday
    • 2 Stars >
      • The Art of Racing in the Rain
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      • Dora and the Lost City of Gold
      • Frankie
      • Glass
      • Isn't It Romantic
      • Midway
      • Red Joan
      • Spider-Man: Far From Home
      • What Men Want
    • 1.5 Stars >
      • The Aeronauts
      • Angel Has Fallen
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      • The Goldfinch
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      • Serenity
      • Terminator: Dark Fate
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      • Men in Black: International
      • Miss Bala
      • Stuber
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      • Happy Death Day 2U
  • Cinema Clash Podcast
  • 2018 Films
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      • The Ballad of Buster Scruggs
      • Burning
      • The Death of Stalin
      • The Favourite
      • Isle of Dogs
      • The King
      • Roma
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      • American Animals
      • Avengers: Infinity War
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      • Hostiles
      • The Insult
      • Mom and Dad
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      • Ready Player One
      • Skate Kitchen
      • Sorry to Bother You
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      • Vox Lux
    • 3 Stars >
      • Annihilation
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      • Deadpool 2
      • Eating Animals
      • Flower
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      • The House with a Clock in Its Walls
      • Journey's End
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      • Mission: Impossible - Fallout
      • Paddington 2
      • The Price of Everything
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      • Support the Girls
      • Venom
    • 2.5 Stars >
      • Aquaman
      • Bohemian Rhapsody
      • Creed II
      • Game Night
      • The Gospel According to André
      • Hotel Transylvania 3: Summer Vacation
      • Mary Poppins Returns
      • Mile 22
      • Operation Finale
      • The Party
      • Peter Rabbit
      • Scotty and the Secret History of Hollywood
      • Sicario: Day of the Soldado
      • A Simple Favor
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      • The Spy Who Dumped Me
      • Wildlife
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      • Ant-Man and the Wasp
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      • Death Wish
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      • The Equalizer 2
      • Film Stars Don't Die in Liverpool
      • Generation Wealth
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      • The Meg
      • A Midsummer Night's Dream
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      • Peppermint
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      • A Wrinkle in Time
    • 1.5 Stars >
      • The Commuter
      • Detective Dee: The Four Heavenly Kings
      • Fifty Shades Freed
      • Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom
      • Maze Runner: The Death Cure
      • The Predator
    • 1 Star >
      • Gauguin: Voyage to Tahiti
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      • Born Guilty
      • Kin
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  • 2017 Films
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      • It
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    • 3 Stars >
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    • 2.5 Stars >
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      • The Zookeeper's Wife
    • 2 Stars >
      • Beauty and the Beast
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      • Ingrid Goes West
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      • Leap!
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    • 1.5 Stars >
      • Before I Fall
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      • The Dinner
      • Everything, Everything
      • The Fate of the Furious
      • Fifty Shades Darker
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    • 1 Star >
      • Rings
      • The Space Between Us
      • xXx: Return of Xander Cage
    • 0.5 Stars >
      • Buster's Mal Heart
  • 2016 Films
    • 4 Stars >
      • Captain Fantastic
      • Hell or High Water
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      • Jackie
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      • La La Land
      • A Monster Calls
      • Paterson
      • Silence
    • 3.5 Stars >
      • The Accountant
      • Cameraperson
      • Deadpool
      • Embrace of the Serpent
      • Finding Dory
      • Hail, Caesar!
      • Miss Sloane
      • Moonlight
      • Nocturnal Animals
      • Whiskey Tango Foxtrot
    • 3 Stars >
      • Allied
      • Arrival
      • Author: The JT LeRoy Story
      • The Birth of a Nation
      • The Conjuring 2
      • Creative Control
      • Doctor Strange
      • The Eagle Huntress
      • The Edge of Seventeen
      • Eye in the Sky
      • The First Monday in May
      • Green Room
      • Hacksaw Ridge
      • Ixcanul
      • The Jungle Book
      • Keanu
      • Live by Night
      • Lo and Behold, Reveries of the Connected World
      • The Magnificent Seven
      • Miles Ahead
      • Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children
      • A Monster with a Thousand Heads
      • The Nice Guys
      • Passengers
      • Rogue One: A Star Wars Story
      • Star Trek Beyond
      • Sully
      • War Dogs
      • Wiener-Dog
    • 2.5 Stars >
      • Café Society
      • Captain America: Civil War
      • Christine
      • The Clan
      • Deepwater Horizon
      • Eddie the Eagle
      • Equals
      • The Girl on the Train
      • High-Rise
      • The Infiltrator
      • Knight of Cups
      • Kubo and the Two Strings
      • Lion
      • Little Men
      • London Has Fallen
      • Louder Than Bombs
      • Morris from America
      • Pete's Dragon
      • Popstar: Never Stop Never Stopping
      • Queen of Katwe
      • Race
      • Southside With You
      • Storks
      • Sunset Song
      • Trolls
      • Warcraft
      • Zootopia
    • 2 Stars >
      • Alice Through the Looking Glass
      • American Pastoral
      • Bad Moms
      • The BFG
      • Blair Witch
      • The Choice
      • Dough
      • Everybody Wants Some!!
      • The Finest Hours
      • The Legend of Tarzan
      • The Light Between Oceans
      • The Secret Life of Pets
      • Suicide Squad
    • 1.5 Stars >
      • The 5th Wave
      • Allegiant
      • Angry Birds
      • Bad Santa 2
      • The Boss
      • Central Intelligence
      • Ghostbusters
      • How to Be Single
      • The Huntsman: Winter's War
      • Ip Man 3
      • Zoolander 2
    • 1 Star >
      • Gods of Egypt
      • Ice Age: Collision Course
      • My Big Fat Greek Wedding 2
      • Now You See Me 2
      • Ratchet & Clank
      • Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows
    • 0.5 Stars >
      • Ben-Hur
      • Norm of the North
      • Ride Along 2
  • 2015 Films
    • 4 Stars >
      • The Big Short
      • Ex Machina
      • Jafar Panahi's Taxi
      • Steve Jobs
      • The Tribe
      • While We're Young
      • Youth
    • 3.5 Stars >
      • Best of Enemies
      • Bridge of Spies
      • Brooklyn
      • Clouds of Sils Maria
      • Concussion
      • The End of the Tour
      • The Hateful Eight
      • Inside Out
      • It Follows
      • Mad Max: Fury Road
      • The Man from U.N.C.L.E.
      • The Martian
      • Mistress America
      • The Revenant
      • Room
      • Shaun the Sheep Movie
      • Sisters
      • Spotlight
      • Star Wars: The Force Awakens
      • Straight Outta Compton
      • Truth
    • 3 Stars >
      • The Age of Adaline
      • Avengers: Age of Ultron
      • Black Mass
      • Carol
      • The Cut
      • Entourage
      • Fresh Dressed
      • The Good Dinosaur
      • Grandma
      • James White
      • Janis: Little Girl Blue
      • Kahlil Gibran's The Prophet
      • McFarland, USA
      • Me and Earl and the Dying Girl
      • Merchants of Doubt
      • MERU
      • Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation
      • Mustang
      • Pan
      • The Peanuts Movie
      • Pitch Perfect 2
      • Pixels
      • San Andreas
      • The Second Mother
      • Son of Saul
      • Spectre
      • Trainwreck
      • We Are Your Friends
      • Woman in Gold
    • 2.5 Stars >
      • American Ultra
      • Anomalisa
      • Ant-Man
      • The Assassin
      • The Black Panthers: Vanguard of the Revolution
      • Boulevard
      • Crimson Peak
      • The Danish Girl
      • Far from the Madding Crowd
      • Finders Keepers
      • Furious 7
      • The Gunman
      • Hippocrates: Diary of a French Doctor
      • In the Heart of the Sea
      • Jurassic World
      • Kingsman: The Secret Service
      • Listen to Me Marlon
      • Macbeth
      • The New Rijksmuseum
      • No Escape
      • Spy
      • The Visit
      • A Walk in the Woods
      • The Water Diviner
      • The Wolfpack
    • 2 Stars >
      • The 33
      • Aloft
      • Black Sea
      • Do I Sound Gay?
      • Fifty Shades of Grey
      • Focus
      • Freeheld
      • Get Hard
      • The Hunger Games: Mockingjay - Part 2
      • Joy
      • Minions
      • Mississippi Grind
      • The Night Before
      • The Salvation
      • The Second Best Exotic Marigold Hotel
      • Seventh Son
      • Terminator Genisys
      • Tomorrowland
      • True Story
    • 1.5 Stars >
      • Chappie
      • Desert Dancer
      • Hot Tub Time Machine 2
      • The Divergent Series: Insurgent
      • Jupiter Ascending
      • Maggie
      • Maze Runner: The Scorch Trials
      • Run All Night
      • Ted 2
      • Vacation
    • 1 Star >
      • The Lazarus Effect
      • Magic Mike XXL
      • The Transporter Refueled
    • 0.5 Stars >
      • The Gallows
  • 2014 Films
    • 4 Stars >
      • Calvary
      • A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night
      • Inherent Vice
      • The LEGO Movie
      • Life Itself
      • A Most Violent Year
      • Mr. Turner
      • The Theory of Everything
    • 3.5 Stars >
      • American Sniper
      • Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance)
      • The Boxtrolls
      • Boyhood
      • The Equalizer
      • Fury
      • Gone Girl
      • Guardians of the Galaxy
      • The Imitation Game
      • Like Father, Like Son
      • Mommy
      • Nymphomaniac: Vol. I
      • Particle Fever
      • Selma
      • Top Five
      • Whiplash
    • 3 Stars >
      • 22 Jump Street
      • Alive Inside
      • Beside Still Waters
      • The Book of Life
      • Captain America: The Winter Soldier
      • The Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby: THEM
      • Draft Day
      • Edge of Tomorrow
      • Get on Up
      • Godzilla
      • The Grand Budapest Hotel
      • The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies
      • I Am Ali
      • The Judge
      • Kill the Messenger
      • Locke
      • Love Is Strange
      • Nas: Time Is Illmatic
      • Night Moves
      • The November Man
      • The One I Love
      • The Overnighters
      • The Raid 2
      • Rosewater
      • Sin City: A Dame to Kill For
      • St. Vincent
      • Still Alice
      • Supermensch: The Legend of Shep Gordon
      • Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
      • Two Days, One Night
      • Unbroken
      • Under the Skin
      • Wild
      • X-Men: Days of Future Past
    • 2.5 Stars >
      • 3 Days to Kill
      • About Last Night
      • Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day
      • Art and Craft
      • As Above, So Below
      • Begin Again
      • Blood Ties
      • Dawn of the Planet of the Apes
      • Divergent
      • The Expendables 3
      • Fading Gigolo
      • Foxcatcher
      • The Giver
      • The Grand Seduction
      • Horns
      • Horrible Bosses 2
      • The Hundred-Foot Journey
      • Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit
      • Jersey Boys
      • Listen Up Philip
      • Magic in the Moonlight
      • The Maze Runner
      • Men, Women & Children
      • A Million Ways to Die in the West
      • The Monuments Men
      • Mr. Peabody & Sherman
      • Muppets Most Wanted
      • Need for Speed
      • Non-Stop
      • Point and Shoot
      • RoboCop
      • Tracks
      • Transcendence
      • Veronica Mars
      • Winter's Tale
    • 2 Stars >
      • 300: Rise of an Empire
      • Alan Partridge
      • The Amazing Spider-Man 2
      • The Art of the Steal
      • Big Hero 6
      • Blended
      • Exodus: Gods and Kings
      • The French Minister
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    • 1.5 Stars >
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      • I, Frankenstein
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      • Transformers: Age of Extinction
    • 1 Star >
      • Brick Mansions
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      • Son of God
      • Tusk
      • Vampire Academy
    • 0.5 Stars >
      • Left Behind
      • The Legend of Hercules
      • Paranormal Activity: The Marked Ones
    • Zero Stars >
      • A Haunted House 2
  • 2013 Films
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      • Frances Ha
      • The Gatekeepers
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      • We Steal Secrets: The Story of Wikileaks
    • 3.5 Stars >
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      • God Loves Uganda
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    • 3 Stars >
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      • Dead Man Down
      • Deceptive Practice: The Mysteries and Mentors of Ricky Jay
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      • Love Is All You Need
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    • 1.5 Stars >
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      • The Incredible Burt Wonderstone
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    • 1 Star >
      • The Hangover Part III
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  • 2012 Films
    • 4 Stars >
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    • 3 Stars >
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    • 2 Stars >
      • The Deep Blue Sea
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    • 1.5 Stars >
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  • 2011 Films
    • 4 Stars >
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    • 2.5 Stars >
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    • 1.5 Stars >
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      • Priest
      • Restless
    • 1 Star >
      • The Three Musketeers
      • Toast
      • Transformers: Dark of the Moon
  • Misc...
    • 2019 Middleburg Film Festival
    • 2019 AFI DOCS Film Festival
    • 2018 AFI DOCS Film Festival
    • 2017 Middleburg Film Festival
    • 2016 Middleburg Film Festival
  • Review Index
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The Zookeeper's Wife

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Directed by: Niki Caro
Written by: Angela Workman - Based on the book by Diane Ackerman
Starring: Jessica Chastain, Johan Heldenbergh, Daniel Brühl, Timothy Radford, Efrat Dor, Iddo Goldberg, Shira Haas, Michael McElhatton, Val Maloku
Biography/Drama/History - 124 min          Reviewed by Charlie Juhl on 29 Mar 2017

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It is hard to think of a more tense declaration and foreshadowing of doom than a film introduction setting the scene with “Poland, 1939”.  We immediately realize we’re not in for butterflies and rainbows.  No country lost more of its population per capita than Poland did in World War II.  This Eastern European country was pulverized twice, first by Nazi Germany and then be marauding Soviets.  Audiences are more than familiar with true story films set in the most notorious concentration camp of them all, Auschwitz-Birkenau, located in Poland, and a based on a true story film was even recently nominated for Best Foreign Film in 2011 with In Darkness, following a group of Jewish families hiding in the sewers of Lvov.  The Zookeeper’s Wife joins this long line of heroic accounts and memoirs of Jews hiding from the Gestapo and the very few brave souls who attempted to shelter them.

Broad brush World War II histories mention Warsaw twice.  The Warsaw Ghetto and its subsequent brutal liquidation are comprehensively covered in the history books as is the Warsaw Uprising by the Polish resistance Home Army.  Both of these entities receive at least cursory recognition in The Zookeeper’s Wife, but they are not central locations or themes.  Director Niki Caro’s film explores the efforts of the real life Zabinski family, centered on the matriarch, Antonina (Jessica Chastain, Miss Sloane), and their efforts to function as a sort of waypoint on the Jewish Underground Railroad out of Warsaw.

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The Zabinskis operate and run the day-to-day business of the Warsaw Zoo.  The film’s first scene takes us on a tour of the park as Antonina checks in on the expectant elephant family, the predator cats, and the monkey cage as a trotting adolescent camel escorts her acting as co-pilot.  According to screenwriter Angela Workman’s script, the Warsaw Zoo was a significant aerial target on 1 September 1939 as the Wehrmacht annihilated Poland’s token Army and swept across the country.  Caro forces the audience to endure a brutal animal slaughter by air-to-ground munitions.  Zebras are torn to shreds, mama and baby elephant are early collateral damage, and a suspiciously well-organized militia gathers at the zoo to shoot some more animals deemed threats to the general public.

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I assume the invading Nazis were a greater threat at the time to public health and safety than papa elephant, but the militiamen are more than eager to hand their rifles over to the Germans after they’re finished with the animals.  The new occupiers finish the job and ensure the audience understands the barbarity of the situation as they play target practice with most of the remaining animals.  After Caro finally lets us go and moves on from blowing holes in most of the passengers of Noah’s Ark do we get down to what we’re all here for, the subterfuge of transporting and hiding Jews from the Ghetto right under the Nazi’s noses.

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Antonina’s husband, Jan (Johan Heldenbergh), rigs a system to take trash from the Ghetto to feed the pig farm the Zabinskis now run on behalf of the Third Reich and spirits two to three people at a time beneath the garbage in his truck.  Using underground tunnels underneath some of the exhibits and their own basement to hide and shelter their charges, Caro (McFarland, USA) shows the Zabinskis save kids, women, and sometimes entire families right out of the Ghetto.  The most shocking and long-term ‘guest’ is Urszula (Shira Haas), a pre-teen gang-raped by Nazis just off screen that is stomach-churning in the most extreme.  Antonina, always shown cradling a baby, be it an elephant, bunny rabbit, and even lion cub, cradles Urszula in a similar manner as she very slowly reintegrates her back into reality.

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The Nazi in charge of the place is Lutz Heck (Daniel Brühl, Captain America: Civil War), who labels himself Hitler’s Chief Zoologist.  Heck has two ambitions.  One is to practice ethically suspect animal husbandry experiments attempting to reintroduce extinct species back into Germany and two is to attract the sexual attention of Antonina whom he takes a sleazy liking to.  Caro opts for too literal showing us through body language the sloppy thrust and repel attempts between the two.  Heck has Antonina hold onto a female bison during that animal’s rough impregnation while Heck holds onto her from behind mimicking the conjugal action.  We get it Ms. Caro; no need to take it over the top.

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The Zookeeper’s Wife makes a wild and off-putting jump three quarters of the way through as it tries to squeeze the last three years of the war into 30 or so minutes.  Antonina’s son turns into an inexplicable jackass whose only purpose is to skew the plot where it needs to go and Antonina gives birth out of nowhere to show the giant leaps in time the film skips over.  I can only assume the 2007 non-fiction book by Diane Ackerman upon which these events are based does not come across in the same haphazard and choppy manner.  The Zookeeper’s Wife is acutely graphic in parts and I felt more squeamish than I did during the entire movie about human cannibalism I saw last week.  The Zabinski family’s endeavors are only a minor entry in pop culture’s examination of the Polish experience in World War II not because of anything they did or did not do, but the film introducing them to the world is a middle-of-the-road drama which many will only remember for quadruped carnage rather than the savior of some of the world’s most innocent victims.

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