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THE BOY IN THE STRIPED PAJAMAS Send This Review to a Friend
Seeing the horror of the Holocaust through the innocent eyes of a child gives power to “The Boy in the Striped Pajamas,” written and directed by Mark Herman and adapted from John Boyne’s novel. Although there are plot and logistical contrivances, the basic situation and the bond that develops between two children, one the son of a Nazi commandant, the other a Jewish child in a concentration camp, tugs at the emotions and further illustrates the horror of the Holocaust. The film also demonstrates anew that moving stories can still emerge from a subject already so extensively explored.
There is also satisfaction of seeing a Nazi family suffer consequences—although that gets ahead of a story better experienced as freshly as possible by the filmgoer. David Thewlis is excellent as the authoritarian Nazi, who is newly assigned to head operations at a concentration camp where Jews are being exterminated. He takes his family along--his wife, daughter and young son Bruno--to live in elaborate quarters near the camp.
The daughter is filled with Nazi ideology, but the focus is on Bruno, an eight-year-old, exceedingly well-played by Asa Butterfield, who is filled with curiosity when he sees the camp but thinks it is a farm. Efforts are made to shield him from reality, but Bruno has a habit of wandering off and one day he notices a little boy on the other side of the fence. His name is Shmuel (Jack Scanlon), and the lads become friendly, with Bruno paying periodic visits. Shmuel, in his striped prison garb, looks terribly forlorn and, of course is hungry, and Bruno, with his instincts, wants to help him. One can say it is unlikely that Shmuel could freely be hanging out at the fence, but this film succeeds in making one accept the circumstances because of the strength of the bond forged.
Where will this lead? There is further contrivance, but the emotions can sweep skepticism aside, as the story gains traction and suspense and one is drawn into seeing the state of affairs through the eyes of Bruno and Shmuel. There is also the keen observation of the situation inside the Nazi household, partly through focusing on the humiliating way in which a servant taken from the camp is treated.
The freindship between Bruno and Shmuel and the consequences give the film a haunting power, and one is likely to be left with the images of these two children caught in a situation that neither can fully understand, a situation dreadfully symbolic of the inhumanity of which man is capable in contrast to the innocence of children before society imposes its prejudices and horrors. A Miramax release.
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