The Boy in the Striped Pajamas

Any movie involving eight-year-olds and Nazis is bound to be an upbeat romp through a child’s imagination, as we all know. Oh wait, upbeat romp? I mean depressing on par with The Downward Spiral. The Boy in the Striped Pajamas brings no surprises in its emotional direction. It is the story of a young boy named Bruno (Asa Butterfield), whose father is a Nazi commander. The boy and his family are forced to move to the countryside, and Bruno must leave all his friends behind. However, after a bit of exploring around the new house, Bruno finds a concentration camp, where he meets another boy his age. Only this boy happens to be on the other side of the fence.

Of course, Bruno does not understand the situation very well. Throughout much of the movie, he refers to the camp as a “farm,” and wonders why all the farmers are wearing pajamas. Much of the intended drama comes from this type of misunderstanding. Bruno’s ignorance is meant to reflect his innocence, and this innocence is meant to contrast the horrors of these camps quite directly. Needless to say, the boys’ friendship is one of the main sources of drama. The problem with that, however, is that neither boy can act incredibly well. Bruno plays his part fine, I suppose, though some of his more emotional reactions feel less than authentic. The other boy, Schmuel (Jack Scanlon), hardly does more than deliver his lines. His attempts at fear, shame, or, uh, more fear, are usually little more than him looking around rapidly. I suppose it’s asking a lot to expect eight-year-olds to carry such dramatic weight, but they could have done better.

That being said, I feel that the person doing the most emotional work was the mother’s makeup artist. The only time that I felt any character was really having a believable reaction to their surroundings was the mother’s (played by Vera Farmiga) reaction to a certain revelation about the camp, and much of her response came from the fact that she looked like she hadn’t slept for days. Whoever was doing her makeup did a great job. Kudos. Oh, and Pavel (the house’s Jewish servant) played his part very well, and was one of the more convincing characters.

At just over an hour and a half, there should have been more than enough material to keep the story engaging the entire time. I mean, you’re in Nazi Germany, it’s pretty fertile ground for storytelling. Yet for about a half hour in the middle of the film, the action dragged quite a bit. There were a number of scenes here that were comprised mainly of reaction shots of all the characters staring at each other, saying very little. If the pace had continued to drag much longer, I might have left. But I suppose if I could sit through Miracle at St. Anna, I could make it through this, a movie nearly half the length. Thankfully, it got interesting again and I was glad to have stayed.

The cinematography was one thing in particular that I did want to commend. There were a lot of shots that were particularly clever and helped shape the overall perspective and feel of the film. One in particular had Bruno sitting on the stairs at his new home, with a series of vertical bars between him and the camera, not only foreshadowing events to come but also declaring his distaste for the new house, which is well-guarded and which must, to him, feel like a prison. The home he lived in at the beginning was very open and in the city, where Bruno and his friends enjoyed running around, arms outstretched like wings…

While there were a few points in this film where I felt I was being slapped in the face with the message (though, realistically, it’s hard to be subtle with this subject matter), overall it was reasonable. I didn’t feel that anything extraordinarily new was brought to the table, but I didn’t feel entirely disappointed for having seen it. It’s not that it’s bad, really, it’s just not the most memorable movie I’ve seen recently. With an ending that’s just about as depressing as you could imagine based on the setup, you’re not going to leave this one in the cheeriest of moods. But you knew that already.