Rama’s SCREEN

This is arguably one of the most depressing movie of the year and yet at the same time it could arguably be considered one of the best. THE BOY IN THE STRIPED PAJAMAS only delivers for a certain number of target audience whose souls have been ready to take in such heavy story with a tragic ending that’s sure to… either make you shed some tear or keep you in silence like you’re remembering the loss of a friend. I for one find it inspiring, necessary to watch, thankful someone has made a movie about it and for some strange reason, it almost feels like a sin if you miss out on it.

“The Boy in the Striped Pajamas” is a fictional story that offers a unique perspective on how prejudice, hatred and violence affect innocent people, particularly children, during wartime. Through the lens of an eight-year-old boy largely shielded from the reality of World War II, we witness a forbidden friendship that forms between Bruno, the son of Nazi commandant, and Schmuel, a Jewish boy held captive in a concentration camp. Though the two are separated physically by a barbed wire fence, their lives become inescapably intertwined. The imagined story of Bruno and Shmuel sheds light on the brutality, senselessness and devastating consequences of war from an unusual point of view. Together, their tragic journey helps recall the millions of innocent victims of the Holocaust.

What I love about this movie is the same thing I love about It’s a Beautiful Life, the heart-wrenching humanity that comes out of innocence. I give standing ovation to the two child actors who play two unlikely best friends when they’re supposed to be enemies instead. Asa Butterfield who plays Bruno whose perspective is the one that takes through this whole endearing journey of what it means to be there for a friend and Jack Scanlon, the young kid who plays the character Schmuel, a Jewish kid imprisoned in the Death Camp knowing that his newfound friend may not realize what’s going on but is determined not to mess him up with the details that even he himself isn’t sure about. At times it sorta reminds you of The Kite Runner, but the redemption over the betrayal between the two boys resolves fairly quickly instead of spanning over a lifetime.

I gotta give credits also to Vera Farmiga and David Thewlis, each respectively plays the mother and the father. Vera wasn’t that impressive in The Departed, but in this movie, she’s beginning to show signs of greatness, David as a cold-hearted soldier, trying hard to bury any disagreement within his conscience and replace it with loyalty to fatherland no matter how wrong it may seem gives a performance worthy of a best supporting role nomination.

I love the cinematography and of course, movies like this are bound to have sensitive, haunting music that stays with you. Based on the novel by John Boyne, writer/director Mark Herman brings us the same type of violence that the movie Hotel Rwanda brought and by that I mean the kind that may not show much graphic but it’s so well made in its dialogue and directing that you can just sense how intense the violence around the family escalates due tot he father’s job which is the guard for the camp. It affects just about everybody who may be directly or indirectly involved with the job. It’s a like flesh eating bacteria that’s slowly deteriorating or eating away everything that used to be good about them. There’s this rule in the movie about how if someone knows that a family member disagrees with Hitler’s policy, he is to report that relative to the government, those who don’t will be punished. In the father’s case, without him knowing it, hiw own punishment comes in the form of his son’s friendship with the boy in the striped pyjamas. He soon feels that punishment and regrets it.

Last but not least, The story itself is so powerful, it’s hard to put it in words, you just have to watch it to capture the themes and let them remind all of us that we’re all people… no matter what race, ethnic, background, religion, lifestyle, we are all people, equal and friendship goes beyond any border or electrical fences that some ignorants try to put up. Friendship forgives, it’s loyal and courageous right to the very end.

* Place the cursor on the image below to check my grade for this film