The Boy in the Striped Pajamas Movie Review

Nazi Germany and World War II history has become a point historical interest for me in the past couple of years. I took the opportunity to visit the site of the Dachau concentration camp during a trip to Germany one year; it was a good experience, though not a particularly happy one. Such as been my reaction about movies set during the holocaust; good, but not happy. I actually heard about The Boy in the Striped Pajamas (2008) at the Dachau concentration camp, and wanted to see it after my harrowing and humbling experience there.

Eight-year-old Bruno (Asa Butterfield) lives in prewar Germany with his sister Gretel (Amber Beattie), his mother Elsa (Vera Farmiga), and his high ranking SS officer father Ralf (David Thewlis). They move from their affluent lifestyle and home to a spot out in the country where Bruno’s father is to take command of an adjacent prison camp. Bruno Is curious about what he believes to be a farm, where the farmers wear striped pajamas; his parents try to keep him away from what is actually the prison camp. But being the ever curious and bright-eyed child that he is, Bruno ventures out in the trees behind his house until he comes upon a barbed wire fence with a boy on the other side wearing the same striped pajamas he saw the “farmers” wearing. This Jewish boy in the striped pajamas is named Shmuel (Jack Scanlon). Despite warnings to Bruno from his family other SS soldiers that frequent his house, Bruno and Shmuel become friends; neither one understanding that this is a prison camp for Jews awaiting extermination.

There are a lot of holocaust movies that have been made; it’s universally agreed that the Nazi’s inhumanity to man was a bad thing. It has almost become a cliché that Nazis are unquestionable villains; kind of the go-to organization when you need a pre-established group of reprobates that everyone already hates. They were used this way in Captain America: The First Avenger (2011) and in the upcoming movie Iron Sky (2012). In The Boy in the Striped Pajamas, the Nazi’s are certainly depicted in an unflattering light, but also shown that they are still human. They had families, they had hopes and dreams, and they wanted to live comfortably and safely. I think this was shown best through Bruno’s mother; while she was anti-Semitic, her primary concerns were her family and how the war might affect them. Even she was horror-stricken when she learned what her husband was doing to the Jews at the camp, and it put a serious strain on their marriage.

While this is a holocaust movie of sorts, it’s fairly unique. This is because it was Nazi Germany and the Holocaust seen through the eyes of an eight-year-old boy. Most young children do not understand political alignments, religious affiliations, or the idea of war. Bruno simply saw his father go to the office every morning and return in the evening; just like most children do. There were great political movements that Bruno witnessed, but couldn’t grasp how they might affect him personally. Shmuel told Bruno that he was in the camp because he was different, but even Shmuel didn’t understand why being Jewish was grounds for imprisonment. We, the viewers, know what certain events mean and their repercussions; but since everything is seen through a child’s eyes, the movie doesn’t always develop these events to be meaningful to Bruno. We see Bruno’s sister posting pictures of The Führer and newspaper clippings of Nazi victories on her wall. We see black smoke billowing from the dreaded crematorium. We see Nazi soldiers dragging Jews off screen to yell at them (or worse). Bruno sees all this, too, but has no concept of what it all means. It’s not as though the movie is trying to hide these things, but rather to look at them through the eyes of an innocent child.

Interestingly, all the actors in this movie speak with crisp British accents, not with German accents or subtitles. I think that overall it strongly represents the formality and business-like attitudes of the Nazis, which is the aspect of the war that Bruno sees. It’s all charts, plans, organization, numbers, promotions, and uniforms. It seemed odd at first, but I think it was more effective to present the Nazis this way, given the context and perspective of the film.

As you may suspect, as a holocaust film it has a tragic ending. It’s very sad and powerful, but the movie itself is good. It is not a watered down holocaust movie, but it is a less graphically intense one. I think this is a very important part of history that we should not allow to slip into obscurity. I worry these horrific events may not be communicated well enough to the younger generation. While dramatic and tragic, I think The Boy in the Striped Pajamas would be a good, safe movie to introduce the ideas of the holocaust and genocide to a younger audience (maybe 10-years and up), and be followed up with a discussion about the evils that transpired during World War II.

Movie Review: Source Code

Judging by the preview, Source Code (2011, PG-13) seemed like a generic action flick with stereotypical characters and plot. It looked like it could be worth seeing but not a ground- breaking cinematic achievement. As it turned out, it wasn’t a terribly ground-breaking achievement, but it was much better than expected.

Colter Stevens (Jake Gyllenhaal) is an American Army helicopter pilot, his last memory is on the battle field in Afghanistan. He wakes up on a commuter train in Chicago and realizes he has the identity of one of the train’s passengers. Thoroughly confused, he tries to figure out what is happening. Eight minutes after waking up, a bomb goes off in the train and Stevens wakes up again in some kind of pod. A military woman named Goodwin (Vera Farmiga) speaks to him through a monitor and explains that he needs to go back and find the bomber. Stevens wakes up again, and relives the same eight minutes. But the bomb goes off again, sending Stevens back to the pod with no new information. Stevens demands to know what is happening. Goodwin and Dr. Rutledge (the scientist in charge) explain that he is part of a project that can put someone in another person's consciousness during the last eight minutes of their life. He is not time traveling, just living the last eight minutes of someone’s life. Simply deactivating the bomb would not change anything, but figuring out who the bomber is would help the government find the bomber in real life. Stevens lives the same eight minutes over and over trying to find the bomber, but he finds himself falling in love with Christina Warren (Michelle Monaghan),  the woman traveling with the man in whose consciousness he is living.

The story line in this movie is pretty interesting; it’s almost as if Groundhog Day (1993) and Die Hard (1988) were blended together to form Source Code. You relive the same events over and over until you’ve memorized everything about the people around you, all while trying to stop a very clever terrorist.  There was some good potential for the movie to get boring since you are viewing the same eight minutes repeatedly. However, like Groundhog Day, it keeps showing a little bit more information each time Stevens returns to the train. This gives the audience ample opportunity to see new things and try to figure out who the terrorist is along with Stevens. There is just enough information revealed about the story as it progresses so that the audience is not left bewildered, nor is there so much revealed that the audience figures everything out too quickly.  The movie develops in such a way that it keeps the audience guessing and yet the twists and surprises are not completely unexpected.

Source Code is an action movie, but it has a great theme to it; life is precious and should be lived to its fullest. Stevens is by every means a military soldier, but he is intent on trying to save the lives on the train despite being told that they are already dead in the real world. I thought this was refreshing since even protagonist military officers are often portrayed as combat-driven war machines. When in the pod communicating with Goodwin, Stevens is generally a by-the-book officer. On the train, he’s still a good person with no real intention of hurting anyone, but he is willing to use force to find the terrorist. Military officers do have souls and feelings for people, contrary to how the media and cinema often depict them. Stevens asks Christina several times just before the bomb goes off, “What would you do if you knew you only had one minute to live?” This is a bit cliché, but is applicable to the theme and the concerns Stevens is dealing with each time he asks.

This really was an exciting movie and was lots of fun. It’s worth watching at least once. It may even be worth a second viewing so you’ll know what to look for since you would know the end from the beginning.  Definitely see Source Code, its more intelligent than your average action movie.