Synopsis
The account of keepers of the Warsaw Zoo, Jan and Antonina Zabinski, who helped save hundreds of people and animals during the Nazi invasion.
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Cast
- Jessica ChastainAntonina Żabińska
- Daniel BrühlLutz Heck
- Johan HeldenberghJan Żabiński
- Michael McElhattonJerzyk
- Timothy RadfordRyszard Żabiński (Younger)
- Efrat DorMagda Gross
- Iddo GoldbergMaurycy Fraenkel
- Shira HaasUrszula
- Val MalokuRyszard Zabinski
- Martha IssováRegina Kenigswein
Recommendations
- 83
The Film Stage
There’s something powerful to be read into every action, line, and image. Subtle yet striking, this is a film that is filled with the power of exquisitely executed storytelling. - 75
The Seattle Times
It’s a remarkable story, told in a movie that doesn’t always quite live up to it; except for a few crucial scenes, The Zookeeper’s Wife feels a bit too soft-focus for the devastating story it tells. - 67
IndieWire
Decency, in its raw, instinctive form, is ultimately what earns The Zookeeper’s Wife a place in the self-conflicted canon of Holocaust cinema. - 67
Entertainment Weekly
Even at its most engaging (those cubs!), Zookeeper can’t help evoking the dozens of films that have told these stories before, and better. - 63
Slant Magazine
The film imbues a pessimistic view of the seemingly bottomless depths of human cruelty with sorrowful tragic force. - 60
Screen Daily
This considered, muted drama can’t escape a fussy tastefulness — not to mention inevitable comparisons to more crackling treatments of similar subject matter. - 60
The Guardian
All told The Zookeeper’s Wife is a story worth telling, even if there are a good number of not-so-hot spots along the way. - 50
Variety
There’s no nice way to put it in this case, but The Zookeeper’s Wife has the unfortunate failing of rendering its human drama less interesting than what happens to the animals — and for a subject as damaging to our species as the Holocaust, that no small shortcoming.
