Police are investigating reports that a group of patrons performed Nazi salutes and made racist comments during a screening of an Oscar-winning Holocaust film at a Melbourne cinema on Saturday night.
The patrons were attending a screening of The Zone of Interest, a German-language adaptation of the Martin Amis novel, a fictionalised account of the real-life Nazi commandant, Rudolf Höss, and his family, who lived in a villa at the Auschwitz concentration camp.
A spokesperson for Victoria Police said in a statement that they were looking into the circumstances surrounding the report.
“It is believed a group of patrons performed a nazi salute and called out a racial slur at a cinema on Lygon Street about 9.15pm,” the statement said.
“The exact circumstances surrounding the incident are yet to be determined, and the investigation is ongoing.”
In a statement to ABC radio, a spokesperson for Cinema Nova said staff investigated the incident during the screening, in which a group of four men and one woman were “vocalising hate speech to create a scene inside the auditorium”.
“While staff did not catch these individuals in the act despite spending an extended time in the cinema on two separate occasions, the group admitted to creating a scene when confronted by management at the conclusion of the session.”
Security escorted the group out of the venue and staff reported the incident to police.
Performing the Nazi salute was made a criminal offence in Victoria last year after a spate of incidents, including a group of people dressed in black performing the salute at Flinders Street Station.
A person displaying or performing a Nazi symbol or gesture in public can face fines of up to $23,000, 12 months’ jail, or both.
A Victoria Police spokesperson said: “Police will not tolerate behaviour that incites hatred or violence in the community and understands incidents of antisemitism can leave communities feeling targeted, threatened, and vulnerable.”
The Zone of Interest won best international feature film at the Academy Awards on Monday, and also picked up the award for best sound.
In his acceptance speech, director Jonathan Glazer, who is Jewish, decried the current conflict in the Middle East and said he and producer James Wilson had deliberately made the film “to reflect and confront us in the present”.
“Not to say, ‘Look what they did then,’ rather ‘Look what we do now.’ Our film shows where dehumanisation leads at its worst.”
He continued: “Right now we stand here as men who refute their Jewishness and the Holocaust being hijacked by an occupation which has led to conflict for so many innocent people, whether the victims of October 7 in Israel or the ongoing attack in Gaza.”
