During his interview with Film Inquiry, Ben Kingsley elaborates on the emotional distance he maintained from the character of Adolf Eichmann:
“I never had to get into his mind, his silhouette, his shape. It was molded by my knowledge of his victims and how much they had suffered under him … I did not base my performance on his ideology, I based my performance on the suffering that he caused to some of my closest and dearest friends amongst the survivors.
Kingsley made no attempt to empathize or understand Eichmann’s point of view, and his aloof performance reflects this. Kingsley conveys the frightening banality of Eichmann’s evil through his fastidious attitude and quietness. It is not a mechanical performance, but a cold one. The actor shows how Eichmann was a calculating man who knew exactly how to manipulate others. In one scene, he makes the agent Peter Malkin believe that he regrets the deaths of Malkin’s sister and nephew. In the measured delivery of his lines, Kingsley depicts how Eichmann’s maliciousness was a source of patriotic pride.
Kingsley’s acting method for “Operation Finale” opposes his roles as notable Jewish figures. In “Schindler’s List”, he plays the determined Itzhak Stern who helps save 1,200 Jewish men and women. According to Kingsley’s interview with NPR, during filming, he “had a picture of Anne Frank in my coat pocket, and I would say to this picture of this beautiful girl before takes: ‘I’m doing this for you.'” His affection for Anne also helped him play her father in “Anne Frank: The Whole Story.” Kingsley approaches these significant Jewish roles with love and tenderness, unlike his sinister performance of Eichmann, whom Kingsley wanted to “nail to the gates of Auschwitz” (via The Times of Israel).
