Film

What's on at the cinema plus reviews of the latest movie and DVD releases

The Boy in the Striped Pajamas (2008)

Average user rating

2 reviews

Movie review

From Time Out New York

The central idea of The Boy in the Striped Pajamas—a child’s naive view of the horrors of the Holocaust—forces viewers into a constant awareness of the distance between what they know and what little Bruno (Butterfield) understands. When his Nazi-officer father (Thewlis, exuding a slimy mix of bureaucratic officiousness and underlying sadism) is transferred from Berlin to an undefined job in the country, Bruno worries about being lonely. He’s excited when he spies some sort of “farm” from his bedroom window, though he’s puzzled as to why all the farmers wear those funny striped pajamas. Adventurous lad that he is, Bruno sneaks off the fenced-in grounds of the house and heads over to the farm, where he forms a strange friendship with Shmuel (Scanlon), a boy behind the barbed-wire fence.

Though Bruno can’t work out why Shmuel is so unhappy, we know, and the film relishes rubbing our noses in the irony. Bruno’s mother (Farmiga) gradually works out what happens at the camp, and we get to watch her break down as her casual anti-Semitism comes into conflict with her basic moral goodness. Mark Herman (Brassed Off, Little Voice) knows how to milk the melodrama from every scene, but viewers may feel a little icky about the experience.

Author: Hank Sartin

Time Out New York Issue 684: November 6 - 12, 2008

Email Tweet Share

User reviews of this film

Derek McRiner said...

Posted on May 30 2010 22:51 An interesting if too short film exploring the relationship between a bore, eight year old boy just looking for friendship in unfamiliar surroundings. What he discovers and more importantly how he interprets it, reflects the naivity of other countries that were taken in by the propaganda films of Theresienstat and the like. It would have been more of a poigniant film if the friendship between Bruno and Shmuel had been allowed to develop further. Never the less a good strong film, the likes of which still puts shivers up my spine for the simple fact that the nazis convinced themselves they were doing the right thing.

Report as inappropriate
phil said...

Posted on May 21 2009 13:38 Mixed feelings about this film. Its a good film although it took me a while to get past the actors with strong british accents who are nazis. The ending is sad but yet the film as a whole felt a bit rushed and i didnt feel the freindship of the two boys grow as for me it didnt folow that enough. Its a film worth watching tho and makes you realise just how innocent childhood is.

Report as inappropriate