Niki Caro’s latest creative endeavor is that of directing The Zookeeper’s Wife — a film adaptation of Diane Ackerman’s book of the same name. The Zookeeper’s Wife is based on the diary entries of Antonina Zabinska, portrayed in the film by actress Jessica Chastain. The film shows how zookeepers Antonina and her husband Jan used the cages and tunnels of the Warsaw Zoo to save hundreds of Jews from Nazi attacks in the heat of World War II.
Image via comingsoon.net
On March 4th, 2017, college students from across the country were given the opportunity to ask Niki Caro some questions about her role as a director and the challenges she faced in tackling a historical nonfiction. Below are insights from Niki about feminism, film, and fiction versus nonfiction work.
Q: “You have a history of directing films with admirable and strong female protagonists. Is there something new you have learned from the character of Antonina that is different from the other women in your films?” — Alberto Achare, Chapman University
NC: “Yes, there is. It is her softness, because I think a lot of people still confuse female strength in cinema with women that are really kind of badass and outwardly strong kind of, like guys in girls’ bodies… I’m interested, particularly in this project with exploring characters that are terribly strong, but soft at the same time. And Antonina was very much a woman of her time. A traditional wife: quite subservient to her husband… But her strength is in her softness and her gentleness and her compassion and her love and her journey over the course of this film from a woman that can barely utter a sentence at a cocktail party, she’s so ill at ease with humans, to somebody that will willingly shelter 300 Holocaust survivors in her home and at great risk to herself. Whilst always remaining the soft, kind, compassionate soul. That is the essence of strength for me. I’m very proud to be supporting Jessica and Antonina herself and bringing the image of female strength to the world right now.”
Q: “Not many war movies feature female leads and speak to the importance of Antonina’s strength and her softness but can you speak to the significance of having a strong female character specifically in a war movie?” — Luisa Andoni, University of Miami
NC: “It’s true. And that was one of the reasons that drew me to it. Because war is experienced by everybody. It’s not just experienced by men. And so it’s very interesting to me to see a war movie that focused on the female experience, what it is like to be a woman at war. I mean, it is certainly true that I’ve made a holocaust movie all about women and children and animals. But women, children and animals experience war also.”
Q: “You said that in terms of the Warsaw ghetto that you somehow have to express it in a way that people could handle. What was the biggest challenge you faced in portraying an accurate yet subdued Warsaw ghetto?” — Renee Androckitis, Drexel University
NC: “I think for me it was, it was portraying it emotionally. And a lot of war movies focus on the horror, but for me, one of the key things was experiencing the Warsaw ghetto through the eyes of Jan and his son. The first time, during the movie we go into the ghetto we see it from their truck, from the zoo truck, and it’s Jan that takes us through. And that actor, Johan Heldenbergh was so emotionally open. When we experience it through his eyes, when he says, “It’s worse than I could have possibly imagined,” that is enough. That for me, [is] so powerful that we can experience it through his performance, through his horror at seeing Urszula taken away by the German soldiers. Children that have to eat scraps of food, you know, to make soup. The deprivation, the poverty, the sickness that comes, we experience it all through Jan Zabinski. And that’s a way of communicating, the Holocaust for me in a very emotional way that really made the scene for a movie like this.”
Q: “I heard that you’re going to be directing Mulan which is a story already widely known around the world. So I was wondering how your approach to directing that film might vary from the approach that you’ve had for other films that you have directed.” — Thomas Butcher, Oakley University
NC: “Although the canvas is a lot bigger, my approach doesn’t change at all. I really value the writing very much. I tend to work with writers, for a long time before the script goes into production. I take casting very, very, very seriously as I do my role in communicating the story to an audience. So, I imagine I will do it exactly the same but on a vastly bigger scale.”
Q: “Coming off of McFarland, U.S.A. and now The Zookeeper’s Wife, what is it that draws you to telling true stories?” — Luke Hyland, Loyola University in Chicago
NC: “I began really early on in my career with telling stories that were either true or based in truth or had some central truth to them. I take that responsibility really seriously and I work very, very hard to serve the material as well as I can. It takes my ego right out of it. I literally serve the story and try to meet the need of the story and bring it to an audience that I know from experience will respond well to a story if the story is true. [Whale Rider] taught me that as specific as I can be, as authentic as I can be as a filmmaker, the more universal the film is likely to be. So that’s where I come from as a filmmaker with telling real stories.”
We thank Niki Caro for her time and for talking to us about her newest project! The Zookeeper’s Wife will be in theaters on Friday, March 31st.