“We do not have to visit a madhouse to find disordered minds; our planet is the mental institution of the universe.” – Goethe
This is a sickly twisted coming of age tale about a young boy learning that faith in your parents should not be blindly given, a tormenting, twisted tale of loss and despair during this modern world’s most tragic era. Innocence as pure as an edelweiss flower on a bright Austrian morning, is brought to face Hell on Earth. Marching in a languishing tempo, almost agonizingly, no doubt by Director Mark Herman’s design, we feel the wanderlust and boredom of a ranking Nazi officer’s son, Bruno – played well by Asa Butterfield.
Bruno has to move to the German country-side with his family, because his father, played by the eternally creepy David Thewlis, receives a new assignment, direct from the Fuhrer. We can all relate, on some level to having to bend to our parent’s wishes and, in essence, we take on our own personal assignments – in some twisted sense of duty to our parents. The father must choose duty over family, and honor over sanity to escape the strangling fear of his duty.
The entire film is shot through Bruno’s eye’s and ears, never once straying from this well-designed perspective. You only know what he knows, but, the dramatic irony is biting and swelling throughout the film, like bile in your throat remembered from some incredibly fearful encounter in your life. Challenge yourself to think back to when you were eight years old, what things were important to you then, what outside of your family and friends did you even think twice about? Play, fun, seeking excitement and entertainment was all you needed to focus on.
I was reminded of being in Albania, many times throughout this film, and seeing the children in refugee camps there, I was expecting to see misery and terror, but all I saw were kids, being kids. As adults were weeping without shame just feet from them, these children had only one thing on their mind – play and the pursuit of it, adventure, excitement – anything to remove them from the reality closing in on them. Yet, Bruno was hardly a refugee, or was he? How much choice do you have at eight? None, really, so Bruno was a refugee of his family’s destiny in Germany’s “Great Struggle”.
This film has one theme that really stuck out with me, courage. Knowing you have boundaries of safety and choosing to venture beyond that net of protection, regardless of the outcome, is true courage. John Boyne and Mark Herman were masterful at using the elements of courage and naivety through the youthful experience of both children. Bruno being young, naive, and full of courage ventured beyond the safety of the front yard in his new country home – to a world he would never understand, and a world he could only reconcile through the eyes of a child.
From the back yard, and the garden door slightly askew (in some twisted nod to a ‘wardrobe’ perhaps), Bruno quickly discovers a “farm” with funny farmers that wear odd-looking pajamas, he doesn’t know anything about them, and driven by boredom and intrigue he ventures out to find out more about these strange farmers and their odd smelling smoke stacks. He soon faces a large fence with a little boy sitting near the edge of the fence – an other, an outsider, one of these strange farmers. He wants to know everything there is to know about this boy. And the boy, also eight years old, tells Bruno he doesn’t like the farm, and he especially hates soldiers – never quite explaining to Bruno why, of course.
A bond quickly develops between Bruno and his new friend, Shmuel, played disturbingly deeply by neophyte actor Jack Scanlon, but soon the boys learn that they are not supposed to be friends, which only seems to draw them closer into an almost dreamlike state of acceptance and empathy from both boys.
The attention to detail put into this film should be noted, with dramatic use of crescendo and decrescendo as scenes move almost like a score of music with abrupt blaring intensity – only to be countered by subtle nuances of nobility and even love in the Nazi home.
The supporting role of Lieutenant Kotler was handled superbly and with Norman precision by Rupert Friend – sure to leave a phantom image in your mind’s eye on the drive home. And, yes, this is one of those movies that won’t leave you for a few days, maybe weeks, or longer – it will linger in your soul like an odor of death, thanks in no small measure to the masterful scoring of James Horner – who uses a fairly memorable chord from Enemy at the Gates masterfully at one point in the film. See this film with someone courageous, and prepare to suffer together.
