Review of The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas (2008) by Filipeneto — 18 Mar 2022

World War II and Nazism are themes that cinema has explored abundantly, and the list of good films grows every decade. The particularity that makes this film remarkable is that it takes us to see everything through the innocent eyes of a child, who cannot understand what is really happening, and to what extent his own family is involved in the atrocities that we know happened.

Bruno is a child who lives a sheltered and carefree childhood. He is the son of a German army officer, and the family is wealthy. He knows that his country is at war and that his father is important, and he is helping his country to win the war. But this is basically all he knows or understands about what goes on in the Germany of his time. When his father is ordered to go to the countryside, Bruno is very sad to leave his house and his friends, but he meets a strange child, who wears striped pajamas and lives inside a fenced enclosure, which his mother does not wanted him to see. She's the only one in the family who really understands what her husband is there to do, and the only one to protest it all.

The film is based on a novel written by John Boyne, but despite the source material and the film's fidelity to it, I wonder how immune a ten-year-old could really be to the avalanches of Nazi propaganda, considering that his father was a high-ranking official and the family had natural political connections to the Hitler regime. I don't mean to say that I disagree with Bruno's innocence and the way he doesn't know what's really going on, but it just seems hard to believe, since the Nazis used all means, including youth organizations and public education, to convey their ideology to younger people.

The cast does a truly remarkable job. The spotlight naturally goes to Asa Butterfield and Jack Scanlon. The two young actors knew how to work perfectly and created a very good working relationship, which gives credibility to the friendship of their characters. It's their effort that makes the film particularly touching and human. David Thewlis also did an extraordinary job, incarnating in his character the contradiction of a loving and caring family man who is responsible for the planned and meticulous slaughter of a huge number of people. Is he a monster? Was he turned into a monster? In clear contrast, Vera Farmiga gives life to a courageous mother and wife, who finds herself in the need to protect her children from a reality she cannot agree with, and in which her husband is totally immersed. She is, like Bruno, able to see the human and innocent side of the people her husband says aren't "really people", even though she eventually has to silence what she really thinks about German politics in order not to suffer. Its consequences. Amber Beattie, on the other hand, shows us what happened to many German children and young people, victims of massive Nazi propaganda from an early age. Nevertheless, she is human, and her love interest in a young SS man reveals it, though it sends her further into the Nazi frenzy. The film also has the very relevant participation of Rupert Friend and David Hayman.

Shot mostly in locations around Budapest, the film has a very beautiful, vivid, colorful and luminous cinematography, which fades and shadows as the film moves towards the end. There is a remarkable contrast between Bruno's house in the city (warmer colors, more light) and the gloomy house he goes to later (washed out colors, shadows, less light and a much heavier and more tense environment). The sets, costumes and props are good and in keeping with the time and context. I didn't see any anachronism errors. The soundtrack, signed by James Horner, is memorable and stays in the ear.