No Ordinary Fool

The opening scene of this film depicts three young schoolboys playing as they run home from school. The weather is sunny, the neighbourhood looks pleasant and well-to-do, and everyone is getting on with their business. Once home, one of the schoolboys, Bruno (Asa Butterfield), is told by his parents that Daddy (David Thewlis) has a new job, which means that the family will be moving to the countryside. Naturally, Bruno is dismayed by this news, as he will be saying goodbye to his friends. So far, so Walt Disney-like you might say. Accordingly, you may not be surprised to learn so that this is, indeed, a Miramax film.

The catch, though, is that the neighbourhood in question is a suburb of Berlin, Daddy is a senior officer in the Schutzstaffel, and his new job is to be the commandant of a concentration camp. However, Bruno is too innocent still to understand the importance of such things. Instead, his biggest concern when they arrive at their new home is the lack of anyone to play with, especially as he has been forbidden from going anywhere near the “farm”.

Of course, being naturally curious and devoid of other distractions, Bruno eventually makes his way out to this “farm” where he meets Shmuel (Jack Scanlon), another 8-year old boy, who lives inside an electrified fence. They soon establish a rapport built around Bruno having someone his own age to talk to and the undernourished Shmuel being given food to eat. However, there can be nothing idyllic about this relationship, as the reality of what is happening within the prison camp is just too great an evil to stay hidden for long.

Indeed, the key theme of this film is the loss of innocence. For Bruno, it is to start asking troubling questions about why he is supposed to hate Jews, for his sister (Amber Beattie), it is to put away her dolls and to start succumbing to Nazi ideology, for his mother (Vera Farmiga), it is to realise the full scale and horror of the barbaric atrocities that are being committed under her husband’s supervision. Equally, there is Shmuel, a boy who has forgotten what childhood is supposed to mean and whose principal concerns are not getting beaten and scrounging some extra food to eat. Yet, like Bruno, he is still too young to fully appreciate the awfulness of his predicament.

At the same time, there is a good deal of contrivance and simplification applied to well-known historical events in order to make the story work. For example, at Auschwitz, the brutal reality was that children like Shmuel were generally killed within hours of arriving at the camp because they were deemed to be of no other use. Consequently, this story is more of a parable than anything else. In this respect, the simple yet powerful climax to which it builds does become a harrowing representation of how innocence can offer no protection when morality has ceased to exist.

Directed by Mark Herman, The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas is a faithful representation of John Boyne’s novella of the same name. It is equally a film whose most receptive audience is most likely to be young teenagers. Yet, this is not to deny for a moment that it is extremely well made, deals with a difficult storyline without ever wavering into sentimentality, and will leave most who watch it quiet and contemplative for some time afterwards. For these reasons alone, it is a very good piece of cinema.