Greg Vasich
3-27-02
Life Is Beautiful/ La Vita e Bella must
have been a difficult film to make, and it is certainly a difficult one to watch
and enjoy. The movie is a Holocaust comedy, a concept so seemingly oxymoronic
that it is impressive Benigni makes it work at all. The movies first half is a
treat to watch and laugh with as Benigni effectively uses humor to make a
mockery of growing racial essentialism in Italy. However, when the setting
shifts to a Nazi concentration camp, the unrealistic portrayal of the characters
experiences there keeps the film from entirely succeeding. It creates pathos
through its story of a father desperately attempting to protect his son from the
horrors of the camp. But in order to remain a comedy, the film soft-pedals the
concentration camp at times, while also pulling the plot in absurd directions in
attempts to draw greater sympathy from the viewer.
The story follows the caprices of Guido Orefice (Benigni), an Italian Jew, as he woos and marries a Christian woman named Dora (Nicoletta Braschi). They have a son, Giosue (Giorgio Cantarini), and open a small bookstore, living their lives as normally as possible under growing racial oppression. The Nazis eventually come for Guido, Giosue, and Guidos uncle (Giustino Durano), placing them on train bound for a concentration camp. Dora insists that they take her as well, to which the strangely obliging Nazis agree. Once in the camp, only Guido and Giosue remain together; Dora goes with the other women while Guidos uncle is deemed unfit to work and sent with the other elderly to die in the gas chambers. Attempting to protect his son from knowledge of the horrors surrounding him, Guido tells him all of the prisoners are playing a game, with the Nazi guards simply referees.
The film opens with Guido and another man
literally driving through gorgeous Italian countryside when the brakes go out on
their car, finally stopping near a farm, where Guido meets Dora when she falls
out of a barn into his arms. She tells him a wasp has just stung her and he
exploits his opportune position to suck the venom out of her thigh, explaining
to her the great danger of wasp venom. Guido maintains his zestful spontaneity
throughout the film, displaying a clear awareness of the beauties and joys of
life. He continues to randomly encounter Dora, each time displaying the same
creativity and joyful charm, beginning to win her affections. In one scene,
Guido enters the school where Dora teaches, posing as an inspector speaking to
the students on the superiority of the Aryan race. Guido makes a complete
mockery of the idea, stripping down to his underwear to show off his superior
physique and emphasizing the perfect shape of his ear lobes and his bellybutton
that is so well tied it cannot come undone. The hilarious scene provides a
refreshing reminder that those ideologies of Aryan superiority were not only
evil but also ridiculous and stupid.
However, when the family is transported to a
concentration camp, the film loses some of its effect by soft-pedaling the
concentration camp experience, betraying the reality of the situation in order
to maintain its upbeat tone. The film does visually create a bleaker world
within the camps, with prisoners and soldiers dressed in gray and white and the
camp built with gray stone and steel. But the film attempts to downplay that
bleakness and the effect is has upon Guido. He remains hopeful and repeatedly
lies to his son order to spare him from knowing the evil that surrounds him.
While the desire to protect his son is certainly noble, the way that his son is
placated by his stories in the face of such obvious despair and hardship is
hardly believable. Guido himself seems to remain oblivious to the true nature of
the camps for much of the film, which seems inexplicable considering he is
forced to work with other prisoners all day.
At one point, Giosue interrupts Guido while he is
carrying an anvil in a line of prison laborers, telling him that all the other
children went to take showers but that he ran away since he does not like taking
them. Guido commands him to go take his shower, which Giosue of course refuses
to do. This could be touching and even suspenseful if it was not so ridiculous.
It is impossible to watch the scene without wondering how Giosue simply escaped
from the other children, how Guido can simply stop working for five minutes to
talk to his son, and how Guido has remained so unaware of what those "showers"
actually are.
In a similar instance, Guido hides Giosue in a
wheelbarrow while he and the other prisoners march out to work, only to find an
unmanned microphone along the way. He seizes the opportunity to tell his wife,
along with the rest of the camp, how much he loves her and thinks about her,
allowing Giosue to speak to her too. This continues until the "mean guys who
yell" come for them, and they have to run and hide. The potential poignancy of
this scene is undercut by all of its impossibilities. Hiding his son in a
wheelbarrow, sneaking away from the rest of the workers, and using that
microphone are all so ridiculous that they distract from the action itself. The
film fails to show us how Guido and his son escape the "mean guys" precisely
because anything they would have to do would be even more contrived and
ludicrous than their previous action.
Of course, almost all movies require a certain
suspension of disbelief in order to fully enjoy them, and it s easy to see that
Life Is Beautiful has its heart in the right place, attempting to show a
man who refuses to have his spirit or that of his son broken. However, by
portraying concentration camp life unrealistically, the film only belittles its
subject, doing an injustice to those who lived and died there. And implying that
keeping a positive attitude and outwitting the Nazis made life in the camps more
bearable does nothing to help its cause. It is not a bad film, but it follows a
great first half with a disappointing second. And while the second half is
flawed, it does contain some redeeming moments. But overall, the artificial feel
of the concentration camp leaves a sour taste.