♪ >> from our studios in new york city, this is "charlie rose." ian bremmer is here, the president and founder of a political risk consulting firm. the company published its annual risk report today, outlining the main geopolitical developments to watch in the coming year. this year includes the transatlantic alliance, an increasingly closed euro, china's global footprint, as well as isis. arabia is another country on the list. the country's prime minister announced that trade and

diplomatic links to iran would be cut. tensions between the two countries inflamed after saudi arabia executed a shia muslim cleric with 46 others. i am priest -- pleased to have ian bremmer back at this can -- at this table. how do you go about compiling this list? what do you in your team do, and what are you looking for when you talk about the top risk of 2016? ian: number one, we keep these up on our homepage for the entire year, so i can't just be hitting the headlines this week and making news, it has to actually stick. andave over 130 people, everyone at the beginning is asked to come up with their best and biggest and most insightful, and even some crazy ideas, and then i chop some of them away and i have things going on in my head. my date of the year, we have narrowed it down, done enough writing, and this is what comes out. it's not that we have a crystal you, we don't, i think that

put enough smart people on issues, and you can see the politics of what isn't feasible. it is so much easier to get rid of things that won't happen or are implausible than it is to make protections. so we aren't calling who the next president is going to be. charlie: but what you do know is? is mostt we do know importantly, i've run this for 18 years now. i've never seen a june political -- a geopolitical environment that has concerned me this much. a lot of instability. what concerns me is that we have six failed states across the broad middle east. we have a record level of refugees globally, we have the terroristful organization, and the global context of that will make sure that all of those things get worse over the course of 2016. that worries me. what worries me is to go back to risk a number one, that the world for the past 70 years, the

transatlantic relationship, is that its weakest point -- it is at its weakest point. charlie: define what weakest means. ian: it means that the united states, in the middle of a polarizing election, is talking about foreign policy and national security in terms of building amuslims, wall with mexico, but absolutely not in terms of a relationship with europe. charlie: is that because most of the dialogue is about and from trump? ian: i think it doesn't help. i think outsiders are playing as much of a political role as they have in europe for the last few years. while i don't think the u.s. election is a risk of, i don't think it will impact investment or any of that, but i do think the impact of 2016 will matter internationally.

when you think about america's european allies, britain, france, and germany, and how they look at what their priorities are, britain is looking for cash. they want investments into britain. they see that the americans are --ful for that going forward not that useful going forward, but china is writing the checks, so britain wants to be the best friend of china. i see the friends -- french saying they are concerned about security in their region, the united states is not looking like much of a leader there. russia is suddenly playing a big role in syria, we want to hedge with the russians. the germans, they say they are going to take 200,000 refugees a year, but the united states is not going to do anything. but the turks have 2 million refugees, we need to keep them there and make a deal with them. i see the europeans out of

security, fear, and proximate concerns saying that there are other things that matter a lot more to us right now. you say the transplant alliance was a failure of leadership about america. ian: i think the europeans being weak does matter here, but there is no question -- charlie: but they are, and you are look -- and they are looking for something from america. it is an indictment of the -- president obama's leadership, the end of the transatlantic alliance. ian: if you had to put the blame on the end of the trans atlantic , certainly the united states deserves the lions share of the blame, but if there is one thing we have been able to count on from europe, it is

german leadership, and merkel. merkel is a lot weaker. time magazine just named merkel the 2015 person of the year. in favor of the alliance, one reason i thought we should do that is because it is her last chance. charlie: what do you think the threat of refugees is to stability? ian: in europe are more broadly -- or more broadly? charlie: let's start with europe. the swedes pulling up border controls, denmark saying we have to do that ourselves as well. the growth of populism. 27% ofional front with the popular vote, and historic high in france. as well in terms of how macy's they secured, which is zero, but that's

because the mainstream parties -- how many seats they secured, which is zero. charlie: but it was seen as a loss. ian: because they didn't get seats, yes. if you ask me, do you think the betterl front is doing than ever in france, the answer is unequivocally yes. so this is the rise of that kind of populism. ian: this is the rise of that kind of populism, and it is the fact that merkel's ability to ,ohere at the end of the day leadership of europe is staunchly undermined by what is such an unpopular position. when you look at the german industrialists, they are supporting merkel. this isthese people, stimulus for the german economy, and meanwhile our population is shrinking, we need an extra million people. charlie: what they do is they

provide buying power. ian: that's right. thrown atney being these refugees is going directly into the economy. they are spending all of it. it's not like they are saving it . but you are right, the issue of are you willing to integrate syrian refugees -- not only are they muslim, but these are not the most educated. it is not like turkish workers coming over. and of course, there is enormous psychological damage that comes after your country has been destroyed. a lot of families are ripped apart. proximate security because of terrorist threats in germany that they had not been dealing with. charlie: what about the leadership in europe? think one of the

things that is interesting, you and i have spoken about peyton quite a bit earlier -- peyton quite a bit over the air -- putin quite a bit over the years. not a shy man. he is also not constrained. that what we are finding -- charlie: but they also believe they have a larger mandate. they arethey believe being treated badly internationally. i would add to that list something i am sure we will get the saudi deputy crown prince. he put those guys together, you have leaders that -- you put those guys together, you have leaders that are strong at home. they are fairly unpredictable and in an environment that is getting more challenging. charlie: unpredictable because he is young and unexperienced, or because his views are such? ian: because he is young and

inexperienced, but his country is in a whole. -- hole. the media is not going to criticize them. charlie: but what about the crown prince? crown prince is increasingly getting edged out. you see that in policies. charlie: father and son running the country. ian: it seems to be, and the father moving the country -- moving the sun along as fast as possible. this thingke me to that recently happened in terms of the execution of 47 people, including a spirit cleric -- shia cleric. ian: we were ok with 46. 47 just knocked us over. charlie: why would they do that? ian: why would they also roundup hundreds? we didn't complain when they were put in jail and said they were isis connected. it's not like they have due

process in saudi arabia. they are doing a lot. it is kind of like -- let me make an analogy -- it's kind of like when you are in china and they do their anticorruption, anti-monopoly, below for they go out -- but before they go after the chinese companies, they round up other companies and builder of national credibility. the saudi's are going to go after 36 sunnis who they say are connected to al qaeda and isis and are living there. why didn't they pick them up five years ago? suddenly, they found all of them? it's because of actions that took place 10 years ago. ian: that's right. it's not because they did not know any of this, but they are under international pressure. from ational pressure geopolitical environment that has turned against them as badly as it could. charlie: so they gave credibility, relieved the pressure by executing 47 people?

i don't understand that. how does that eliminate pressure against them? ian: isis has become an issue an issue, perhaps the top priority for isis in the united states is containing them to some degree. helped birth's this movement. so the saudis are saying, look, we see this organization has grown, we see them in yemen, iraq, and syria, and even at home, and we are not just going to sit i, we are going to go after these guys. if you are going to go after sunni extremists and you are the saudi kingdom, you have to show that it is wacky she is too. by the way, this guy wants to tear apart our country. what he was doing,

he was absolutely calling for independence of the eastern peninsula in eastern arabia, where there are over 2 million shia and saudi citizens. that is as close to signing the death warrant as you can get in saudi arabia, not something that we would support. charlie: but you are saying they killed him mainly because the rest were sunnis, and therefore they had to have a shia that they would kill? ian: that is a bit part of it. i am saying that you see this all the time. if you don't want to be figure to only be pointed at you, and they see that wahhabism -- charlie: and did they assess the risk? ian: of course. charlie: and they probably talked about it a wild. ian: especially because right now, you know that you are going to cheese the americans off because we are trying to implement this iranian nuclear deal.

for the saudi's, this is real. this really threatens them. their top enemy is iran. ian: and oil. it's both. i have had at least five clients call me up and asked me today, did i believe that the saudis as a wayg this simply to get the iranians off their case. in other words, did they believe this was going to go away once they killed this guy. there was no way that was going to happen. charlie: what did they believe? ian: the saudia have huge haveems at home -- saudis huge problems at home. charlie: so you're saying the

saudi's did this intentionally because they want to escalate the tension in iran. ian: i am saying that the saudis are in a horrible box. their operations are increasingly horrible. this is a country that has taken unprecedented levels of austerity in their economy. charlie: they have to pump oil because they have to pay their bills. what else do they have? look at the bills. what makes saudi arabia -- ian: what makes saudi arabia a legitimate kingdom? -- allows these 15,000 princes to run this country? it is the cash. charlie: the princes did not want to see their people in the streets attacking the saudi embassy. is beingou ask me who more responsible here, the iranians actually are. that's not popular. are saudi arabia right now, and you don't know that you have the cash to keep your

people happy, you might not even have the cash to keep the princes altogether in a line, then you had better provide something. charlie: some intelligence officials say to me, this is all about the royal family. it's about their lack of respect for the president. ian: the american president? charlie: yeah. ian: it is certainly true that the u.s.-saudi relationship has deteriorated dramatically. there are many reasons. product --ergy american energy production, the fact that we have screwed up in iraq and afghanistan. there are many reasons. the factyou are saying that they did this had nothing to do with the displeasure with the relationship with the united states. ian: i am saying that when obama does a deal with iran, knowing that this is going to undermine every shred of saudi stability, that shows that that is not a priority for the united states.

it is perfectly fair, it is reasonable, even supported it at the time, though it was tough. saudis go after and say we are going to execute the shia cleric, and they do it right before they implement the iran deal, they are not doing it to tweak the americans, they are saying we are going to focus on our priorities. everything that was expected to happen is happening, and said that we can implement the deal. we will loosen the sanctions and the money will be unfrozen. that is the moment we are at, correct me if i'm wrong. -- the timing of that and the timing of this is no, since. -- no coincidence. ian: the saudi's do not believe that they can stumble the implementation of the iranians.

they believe they have to maintain the stability of their leadership. if they can point the finger at the iranians, if they can blame -- they set the embassy on fire and they ransacked the consulate, and they can see these evil iranians with their supporters in the kremlin and phosphorus on -- and the kremlin, and we have to do something about it. the problem is, not only did the saudi's not have the economics, .ut they have sudan and bahrain they have the uae to downgrade. crickets. quieter on this set when you and i are not talking. bet is not where you want to if you are saudi arabia. where is egypt? charlie: is he playing china and russia against the united states? to playryone is trying

china against the united states because the chinese are spending a lot of cash. they have $3.5 trillion in reserves. they just sell the securities they own and take the cash. they build infrastructure. they are filling a lot of vacuums. what you see across the top -- charlie: they send that money and make the difference in their own economy? ian: what the chinese don't want to do is keep spending money on infrastructure that is overbuilt. they do want to spend money, and they do want to align their support for their own state owned enterprises and standards. they will do that effectively through 2016. the impact of china around the world for good and for bad is inng to grow enormously 2016. charlie: how will it play itself out? ian: we saw it today.

the united states market goes down 400 points. that was not because of the top risk reports. i think it was a response to the china market going down. charlie: chinese manufacturing was down, and therefore the market went crazy. is that the conventional wisdom? ian: that is, and we have so little clarity in chinese data, yet they are such a big player for everything -- buying cars, buying food, buying iron, you name it. last year, we felt than buying fewer commodities. but we feel when they write big checks. if they are not going to spend at home, they are going to spend it, and you will see countries around the world -- why were the brits first? the founding member of the asian infrastructure bank. why did they do that? charlie: we didn't want them to do it. told the, and they

chinese, we are going to be your best friend. why? because you are going to help us out and write us some checks. that works. in the middle east, the saudis lose, not only because the united states does not care as much about them, but because the are the ones increasing, and the saudi's don't have the cash. that is the problem. i am worried in 2016 that saudi legitimacy is going away, and that will lead the saudi government to take bigger risks, both domestically and in the region. charlie: give me an example of bigger risks. ian: providing greater military support in yemen, syria, and for all of the provinces. charlie: why had they been providing more support in syria? they dried up their support and airstrikes as soon as the united states became a larger factor. ian: yes, they did.

the gulf states in general played very little role in syria. charlie: so why are they now wanting to play a bigger role? ian: i am not talking about helping the americans, i talking about helping those on the ground that they see as ideologically aligned. those are not just going to be syrian rebels that we managed to find in trade. in other words, this is a much anger filter -- bigger filter. charlie: the history of 2015 and the prophecy of 2016 is written, will pit and looksmart? -- putin look smart? ian: compared to obama, p has a serious foreign-policy. that has to annoy the white house to know and thing. -- to know end. the fact that putin could turn up in syria, could change the nation of the ballgame because he is the one to actually put

the military and play, and then force obama to meet him on his terms. god, if i am the president of the world's largest economy and military, that has to really upset me. obama is a pretty cool guy. that would relieve me up at night. charlie: did you hear his response to that? they are playing a weak hand. -- that'st he's dead what he said to steve kroft on 60 minutes. ian: they are playing a weak hand extremely real, -- extremely well, and the united states is sitting on their hands. putin has been able to score a bunch of points. 18 this bad should not be putting points on the board, and they are, and it is because they have not shown up to play. it's like we are the cavaliers and we are sitting lebron until the fourth quarter. we are probably still going to win, but why? 2016,e: do you think in

we will see more isis expansion, more isis see contracting, as we saw in iraq? ,an: the islamic state itself there will be more victories for the us-led coalition. with less landp at the end of 2016. i think going after the -- ramadi was taken in 2015. i think that will occur, but if you have the saudi's and iranians actively in conflict, the geneva process is dead. can set as many people around the table as you want. there is going to be a lot of places where isis as an

cannot establish a caliphate, but will recruit a lot of people. with isis, i don't think your future is holding territory. what happens when isis starts showing up in a serious way? what are we going to do about that? is that when we put boots on the ground? don't know what keeps saudi arabia together over the long term. are startingaudis to recognize that, but the iranians know they are in trouble. charlie: if someone asks, what's the good news, what do you say? ian: there is a lot of good news. we barely talked about asia. and you think about all these

conflicts that you and i have talked about over the years -- india and pakistan, china and japan, even the south china sea, you've got to in all these countries that are reasonably , andg, pretty insulated they are not escalating. i think you are not going to see those risks hit the markets. india-pakistan, you could actually see a breakthrough. charlie: some interesting dialogue. modi came over for the birthday -- ian: and god bless him for doing it. i think it was great. charlie: i do too. ian: the white house, i have heard them say there is absolutely no way putin would cut a deal with japan. putin is the only guy who can cut a deal with japan. if he could sell an island for money, putin could do that. i think there are things to watch in asia that are promising. good piece of news is i

don't think -- as much as we will mash rt about the american elections for the next 10 months -- i don't think you matters. charlie: i cannot believe you are saying that. ian: i don't think trout is going to be elected, but from a risk scenario -- charlie: let's assume -- take trump away from the package for a second, and it is cruz versus clinton. are you saying to me that it does not matter a bit, regardless of what side you are on? on the one hand, one person has said he wanted to carpet bomb syria. ian: there is no question it matters in terms of u.s. foreign policy, but does it matter for the strength of the u.s. dollar? doesn't matter for the u.s. marketplace? ceos i fortune 100 talked to, there is not a single one that would change one bit of their plans and where they are going to invest on the basis of the outcome of this election.

charlie: they don't know that, because they don't know the outcome. ian: you'd think they would be hedging a little. charlie: all i say to you is to look at the difference between assassinations made, for example. are completely right, but we are talking about 2016. you started this by saying, give me some good news for 2016. the good news i am giving you is that the western hemisphere is insulated from this risk, asia is insulated, and the good and ,ad is that as a consequence the united states is under a lot of pressure to act. it's going to hurt them bad. charlie: happy new year. it's a pleasure to have you here. back in a moment. stay with us. ♪

charlie: the film "son of saul" follows a jewish prisoner -- wits. he is enlisted to help with concentration camps. he encounters a dying boy he believes to be his son. the "washington post" said it has the staying power of a loved one's death. it is brilliant. here is the trailer. ♪

♪

[singing in foreign language] ♪ ♪ have laszlo nemes and geza rohrig, who played saul. receiveder has enormous praise, as reflected by the awards and by people who write about the film who have seen it. congratulations. this must have been a hard film to make. tell me how you found the story. read theell, i first

writings of auschwitz years ago. charlie: explain who they are. laszlo: they are the prisoners, almost entirely jewish, in outfits, also other camps, but we were focusing on a auschwitz, forced to assist in the extermination process, to be inside a bodies.ium and burn charlie: they lead them to the gas chambers and then take them to the crematoriums. yes.o: and once they were killed in the gas chambers by the ss, they were tagged to take the bodies to burn them and get rid of the ashes. it was a factory that needed workers. these were the people who were

isolated from the rest of the camp, who did not talk to other , and they had the possibility of eating relatively well compared to the other clothes thatnding were normal. but they knew that they would be liquidated. they carried secrets. bearers of secrets. charlie: i will come to you in one moment with the selection of you in the role that you play in this. they did not tell their stories. laszlo: they could not tell the stories -- charlie: but after the liberation. laszlo: they were not supposed

to survive. commanders survived the liberation of the camps, but some of them wrote about their , putting those secrets into the ground around the crematorium. some of these notes were found after the war, the so-called scrolls of a schmitz -- of auschwitz. charlie: and there was a book called "beneath the ashes?" that is a collection of those texts. these texts are not very well known. i wanted to find a cinematic way to plunge the viewer into the here and now of the extermination. be said it also had to that you wanted to make a different kind of film. you were not happy with films,

or you wanted to make something different than the films about the holocaust that you had seen. laszlo: yeah, i really think that many films have been made by the -- about the holocaust, but not really about it, or the human existence within it, rather taking the holocaust for its dramatic value. transmit something to the viewers about the human condition within the concentration camp. you could not know many things while you were in the cap as prisoner. i really wanted to forget this postwar perception of the ,olocaust based on survival

reassuring things, and really go back to the here and now and see what it was like. i wanted to do it for the dead, because they were more or less forgotten. charlie: how did you get involved, geza? you were a poet in new york. geza: right. my girlfriend had a neighbor who told me one day how he survived, to sortas working clothing and belongings, and he , andwallowing down things later defecated and found diamonds. , i did the same thing -- i wanted to hear if -- know if it works. i swallowed my grandmothers ring and i found it. that was the fascination of the

young child. ,ater on, when i was a teenager when i thoughts she would not have shared this with me. than that,older visited the camp for the first time, i was 19 years old. step-by-step, i was struggling with this issue, but i share the sentiment that most of the movies did not do justice. i found that they were not talking about the real holocaust. charlie: what were they missing? geza: i'll tell you. all these movies are well-intentioned, but you are getting invested emotionally , and peoplehe time survive. two of three jews in europe were

sodered by the holocaust, why are we making films about the lucky third? i found that we have to be honest, we don't have to be , but we haveplicit to state the facts. charlie: why create the story of the son, someone thinks saul thinks is his son? laszlo: we wanted something very simple. we saw that there was no possibility really in the crematorium for a story of another sort. knew that the commandos rebelled in 1944, the only armed rebellion in the history of the camp. they wanted to use it as a backdrop of the main story. the story is almost like a greek tragedy.

a man trying to accomplish --ething that in this case it doesn't make sense in a world that has no , thereo god, no religion usthe possibility to allow to be human. the viewer will have to answer that question. ♪

♪ charlie: this is where saul confronts a rabbi about rights as a child. here it is.

charlie: how did you come out of this film? geza: i was just acting, i was imitating. charlie: it had no impact? geza: of course it did, it's a never-ending story. charlie: you have said everything you have done has prepared you for the role. geza: true, but i would emphasize not only my role -- i met a commando river -- command a member who lives in los angeles, 93 years old, a greek jew. .e saw the movie

it means the world to us. said, i'm ready to put my name on the line for this movie. and the man who is the last surviving? geza: same thing. you're acting would say to them, this is the way it was. geza: i did not have a chance to meet any of them before the shooting. after the liberation, they say there was about eight or 10 alive today, but according to him, he was the last one. met him in los angeles. he is a man who still can smile, there is a spark in his eyes. for me, it is amazing.

at the time of this movie, the survivors of the holocaust will soon not be living among us anymore. charlie: do you have a number? geza: altogether, i don't know. it's just, day by day, there's -- charlie: there's no record-keeping. geza: right. charlie: where do you think this film will fit in the canon of films? i think it is an important step in our vision of the holocaust. i don't know whether we are ready for that can of new vision we might be ready to forget the theatrical versions of the holocaust. remember the four? r? horro

film isyeah, but my very narrow in its focus. it leaves mostly everything to the imagination of the viewer. in a way, this film relies on the viewer. i think there is an innovation, because now the viewer pass to -- has to go through the journey of his film, and it becomes personal because imagination is at work, because we are not showing the horror, but we are showing the human face. is whatthe human face gives this film its importance, holocaust became a sort of abstraction.

we forgot about the face, the individual. date toe too understand. but if you have one person now, it becomes understandable, and a very visceral way. charlie: i totally agree with you. it is the face -- it brings it home. geza: mad something to what laszlo said? i think the commando is a lesser-known aspect of what happened. this film i think fully exposes the crime, the most terrific crime of the nazis -- horrific crime of the nazis, which is deliberately forcing jews to burn jews. how can the most jews be murdered by the least amount of germans seeing involved? in

other words, it was a division of labor. these people had no genuine choice, the sense of moral choice just finished. so besides killing them, they ,lso took their innocence away they forced them to assist in the extermination process. that is the most diabolic aspect evil and pain out of make the victims because of their death. charlie: you have said he almost hasn't -- an obsessive -- has an obsessive quality about him. have two lives in agreement -- you have to live in

a filmmatorium to make like that, that's what makes it difficult, but we were ready for that. charlie: and you brought on historical advisors to keep you close to the truth, or on the truth? yeah, we wrote the screenplay based on the writings of the commandos, and we wanted to anchor this film is much as possible. to the very smallest detail in history. it was important. for me, i studied history. i am not scared of reading documents in history books, and i am really interested in it. i am always interested not to present a history book kind of approach, but being there in a visceral way is i think, if you , it's almost film

but a different planet, rather you place the audience in a real situation. it is a different experience. charlie: this is another scene from the film of saul. here it is.

charlie: what was happening in that scene? this is saul's mission, his pursuit.

this is where he realizes that this boy belongs to him, and he belongs to this boy. no matter what, he is going to do his best to bury this boy. i don't think we mentioned, this boy survived the gas chamber. he beat thet, system. nobody was meant to survive the gas chamber. he survives it and is killed a second time by a knock see dr. -- a nazi dr. successfully. successfully.or seeing this death, he is able to have a shot of feeling. these people were working on autopilot. they could not allow themselves to feel and have empathy. but here, he felt something. so he is grateful for this boy for feeling again.

do for aelse can you dead person besides bearing him? charlie: would you do anything different? laszlo: of course. i don't want to go back to the concentration camp. charlie: never? laszlo: no. charlie: your next film is about hungary? next film is about the story of a young woman right before the first world war. it is in the heart of europe, right before the 20th century was born. is "son of saul" hungary's choice for best foreign film in the academy awards? they are submitting it? laszlo: it is on the shortlist, and we are waiting for the final nominations. charlie: much success.

laszlo: thank you. charlie: a pleasure to meet you. laszlo: thanks for having us. geza: thank you for having me. charlie: thanks for joining us. see you next time. ♪

>> coming this election season, the final film in the wall street trilogy. >> those banks are too much. economic power over the nation. >> wall street will likely less. >> trading capitalism for socialism. >> it is not good. >> bernie sanders and ted devine take on wall street. feel the burn. ♪