Life Is Beautiful: Truly Is

Reviewed by Vickie Reichardt, Cinema Geek

Vick's Rating: (It deserves more than five!)

= There's two hours of my life I'll never see again. Is it too late to ask for my money back?
= They could have done SO much better. Wait for the video.
= Not bad at all. Some solid work.
= Wow! I'm very impressed. I might go see this one again.
= For the love of all that is good and kind in the world, what an amazing movie!!!

Directed by Roberto Benigni

Cast: Guido............Roberto Benigni
Dora..........Nicoletta Braschi
Giosué......Giorgio Cantarini

Every year for me, there's one film that stands heads and shoulders above the rest. It's a benchmark that can't be surpassed, and I know immediately that no other movie I see that year will even come close to being as good or as moving or as powerful or as brilliantly done.

This year, that film is "Life is Beautiful."

I should preface this review by saying that I could spend the rest of my life watching Roberto Benigni movies and still be completely entertained. He's a superstar in Italy (his 1991 film "Johnny Stecchino" is the most successful film in Italian history), but little known in North America, save for rabid fans like me who devour any and all of his cinematic offerings as soon as they hit these shores.

Directed and co-written by Benigni, the film tells the story of a Jewish bookstore owner, loving husband and father Guido (Benigni), who tries to shield his young son Giosué (Giorgio Cantarini) from the horrors of a WWII concentration camp when he and his family are rounded up and shipped off by train. Using humor--both physical and verbal--Guido makes his son believe that their ordeal is all part of an elaborate game, where points are accumulated for things like "not being hungry" or "not being afraid." Through his quick-thinking and ever present joyous spirit, Guido keeps the boy relatively content--and, more importantly, alive--in the face of the gas chambers and certain death.

Much of the film's action centers on Guido's antics and how he constantly tests the limits of his nerve and the patience of the steely prison guards. But in these antics come moments of pure beauty and inspired thought. Moments that had me sobbing in my seat--both because of their purity and because of the sheer non-manipulative aspect of what was happening onscreen. Benigni knows how to show us what someone is thinking or feeling, rather than having them tell us or, worse, turning a simple moment into a giant, epic, please-give-me-an-Oscar showcase.

Take, for example, the moment when Guido's wife, Dora (played by Benigni's real-life wife, Nicoletta Braschi), who is not Jewish, realizes that her husband and son have been taken away by the Nazis and then demands to be taken as well. Braschi's face tells all as she stands opposite an SS officer who doesn't know what to make of a woman who's actually asking to be sent to her death. The scene is played brilliantly and is kept simple. No grandstanding, just a basic request delivered with heartbreaking determination: I want to get on the train. Period.

Other moments in the concentration camp are equally moving. How will Guido get word to his wife, who is being held in the women's prison, that he and his son are still alive? Only Benigni can create a scene so memorable and clever that it's actually putting a lump in my throat right now as I recall it.

Benigni is a gifted physical comedian. His rubberband of a body changes and contorts better than Jim Carrey's ever will, and his rumpled appearance only serves to endear him further. Here, in what is easily his least comedic role, he manages to wring laughs from the audience through their tears and, again, never makes it cheap or easy. His movies are filled to overflowing with brilliantly crafted coincidences and payoffs, and moments you think mean little, until twenty minutes later when they all fall together perfectly. It's difficult to describe if you've never seen a Benigni film but, suffice it to say, the stories are multilayered and clever and tightly written. Always.

Both Braschi, who almost always appears onscreen opposite her husband, and little Giorgio Cantarini are heartbreaking as the family Guido will do anything to protect and make happy. Dora's quiet resolve and Giosué's blissful ignorance of their situation are equally powerful, and the fact that the audience knows what fate awaits them makes it all the more poignant.

"Life is Beautiful" won the Grand Jury prize at this year's Cannes Film Festival, and recently won the Audience Awards at both the Toronto and Vancouver film festivals. I'm sure it's bound for many more accolades, including numerous "best of 1998" lists and such. It's a movie that reaches out and grabs you by the heartstrings and refuses to let go. To this day, I can't read about it, see a trailer or even write this review without getting choked up. It's that good and that affecting.

Some critics have had decidedly more negative reactions to the film, claiming that it makes light of the Holocaust. It doesn't. At no point does the audience get the sense that they're watching a movie about those kooky Nazis and their wacky antics in Europe. "Life is Beautiful" recognizes the horrors of the war and the suffering of its victims, but it's not trying to give viewers the "big picture" like "Saving Private Ryan" or countless other World War II themed epics at theatres or on video. Benigni sets out to tell the story of how one man uses laughter to help his little boy cope with a horrendous period in his life. Nothing more. And the beauty of this movie lies in that simplicity.

Vick's Quick Hits

Pleasantville:

Just when you think you know what a movie is about, it surprises you. "Pleasantville" tells the whimsical story of two nineties teens (Tobey Maguire, Reese Witherspoon) who are zapped into the saccharine world of a fifties television show. But, with their modern sensibilities intact, they quickly turn the bland lives of the show's inhabitants upside down. Add to that some eye-popping special effects and a nicely incorporated, non-whimsical subplot about tolerance and acceptance, and you've got a solid movie. Co-stars Joan Allen, William H. Macy and Jeff Daniels.

Apt Pupil:

Based on a novella by Stephen King, "Apt Pupil" follows a troubled teenager (Brad Renfro), who becomes obsessed with his former-Nazi, war-criminal-in-hiding neighbor (Ian McKellen), demanding to be told the exact details of things like how people died in the gas chambers and what it felt like to kill another human being. Not nearly as exciting or scary as the trailers would have you believe, the film suffers mainly because both leads are so unpleasant and unlikable that there's no one for the audience to sympathize with. Oh, and does anyone really want to watch Renfro smash a pigeon to death with a basketball? I didn't think so. Co-stars, ahem, David Schwimmer.

Vickie, a self-confessed movie addict, has spent the last few years working at an entertainment magazine in Canada. When she's not toiling away at her computer in the office, she's toiling away at her computer at home-- hacking away at unfinished screenplays and planning her acceptance speech for the Academy Awards.