Picture this: being in your pajamas all day, having the biggest yard to play in and only being separated from your best friend by a thin wire fence. Shmuel is Bruno’s dream come true with the ‘ideal life’. A movie of historical tragedy where a young boy makes the most of the unfortunate circumstances. ‘Out-With’, where Bruno and his family get relocated, is Bruno's word for ‘Auschwitz’, a concentration camp in German-annexed Poland, where Jews were imprisoned and killed during the war.
World War II, the deadliest war in all of human history with 70 million people killed. World War II started in 1939 when Germany invaded Poland. ‘The Boy in The Striped Pajamas’ was set in World War II, where 8-year-old Bruno and his family leave Berlin to take up residence at a concentration camp where his father has just become commandant. No people and especially no friends, his dream is to be an explorer, which lead him out behind his house and finds Shmuel, a young Jewish boy. Behind a barbed-wire fence is what separates them, the boys begin a forbidden friendship, although Bruno is oblivious to the real nature of his new surroundings.
‘The Boy in the Striped Pajamas’ is a 2008 historical tragedy film set in World War II. The Holocaust drama relates the horror of the Jewish concentration camp through the eyes of two 8-year-old boys. Mr. Bruno, the son of the camp's commandant, and Shmuel, one of the youngest Jewish inmates. The Holocaust was the systematic, state-sponsored persecution and the murder of 6 million Jews by the Nazi regime and allies. Most Jewish residents lived in countries that Germany who would occupy or influence during World War II. The Nazi, who quickly became in power in Germany in January 1933, believed that German’s where ‘racially superior’ and the Jews were deemed ‘inferior’, who where a threat to the German community. In 1945, the Germans and their allies killed almost 2 out of every 3 European Jews as a part of the ‘final solution’.
“Childhood is measured out by sounds and smells and sights, before the dark hour of reason grows”, by John Betjeman. Bruno, oblivious to everything lives with his family in Berlin, in Nazi Germany during World War II. He learns that his father has a new ‘important’ job, Bruno's mother Elsa and sister Gretel, relocate to the 'countryside' (aka the Nazi concentration camp).
Bruno hates his new home as there is no one to play with and no-where to peruse his dream as an explorer. One day, Bruno disobeys his parents whom have forbidden him to play in the back yard. Meanwhile sneaking off into the shed, eventually arriving at a barbed wire fence surrounding what to Bruno looks like the ideal playground. Finding his new best friend Shmuel. Bruno lacked the knowledge of the camp when it is revealed after Bruno believed that the striped uniforms that Shmuel, Pavel, and the other prisoners wear are pajamas and Shmuel believes his grandparents died from an illness during their journey to the camp.
In Bruno's family, lies and deception are why Bruno is clueless as to what's going on around him. When he asks his mom why they're moving and especially why he has to leave his 2 best friends at home, for example, she just says it's for his dad's 'important' job. When he asks who the people in the striped pajamas are, his father says that they're ‘not people’, and only one could imagine the thoughts that must be going through an 8-year-old’s head. After all, the lies lead to Bruno lying about where he goes and what he does in his free time, it seems possible that with more transparency in his family, Bruno may have had a better end to ‘The Boy in the Striped Pajamas’.
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When Bruno is made to leave Berlin for dad’s ‘important’ job, one of his main complaints is that he also has to leave his 2 best friends. Only to make matters worse, when he gets to the new house in ‘Out-With’, there are no other families or children around therefore, no friends. When he meets his best friend Shmuel, the boy in pajamas on the other side of the fence, it's the beginning of a beautiful yet short-lived friendship. Despite their many differences and ways of viewing life, the boys form a bond that transcends race, even fences. When Bruno was asked if he still wants to go back to Berlin, Bruno confidently says ‘no’. In a world governed by hatred, little did either family know Bruno and Shmuel show that friendship can thrive even in darkness... if Bruno didn’t realest such thing as darkness.
A doctor to an imprisoned slave. What went wrong? Pavel a Jewish slave for Bruno’s family in ‘Out-With’. A former doctor who so many qualifications was forced to throw away his career to become the local slave. When Bruno injured his leg, Pavel took it upon his duty to treat the wound. Surprisingly Bruno’s mother kindly thanks Pavel than began to question if her husband is wrong about how evil the Jews are made out to be. According to Maria, all Pavel wanted was to be a doctor. Sadly, due to the fact he was a Jew, he was brought to ‘Out-With’ being told he now must wait hand and foot for Bruno and his family. It is believed that he practiced as a doctor until he came to the camp. Both Bruno and Pavel made a friendship out of the situation until Pavel was not long after beaten to death by Nazi Lieutenant Kolter, for such an accident when spilling wine on Kolter’s lap at supper.
Shmuel is Bruno's dream come true. Instantly Bruno’s best friend, someone who is willing to give him the answers and someone who always sticks to his word. But Shmuel is no ordinary boy, he's a Jewish prisoner in ‘Out-With’. Shmuel has seen some horrific things even if he doesn’t say so. Although they may be that same age Shmuel knows a lot more than just the average boy. Bruno may be oblivious to the horrors unfolding next door, but Shmuel knows fear, starvation, and violence.
Benoît Delhomme does an amazing job when creating the opening scene. The opening scene coveys a frightening and tense mood. The music continues, becoming softer and serener as if somethings waiting to happen. The music alone has placed a dramatic effect on the beginning to the first scene. The first establishing shots of the movie show a carefree attitude of the children whom are so oblivious to their surroundings. It represents how the children value their friendships and that even from a young age it is heartbreaking to be separated. The shots of the movie create a whole new meaning for every scene.
As a father, a soldier and a commander he takes the head of the table with all respects. For a large majority of the movie, the camera work is done so that you feel immersed. Feeling in-scene is what Benoît Delhomme does best. Through inviting the viewer in every closed door of the film. During the dinner party, killing of servant Pavel Benoît Delhomme’s choice of camera angles makes the viewer feel like they’re in the scene joining the family during their dinner. Followed by a theme of feeling caged not being able to ignore the surroundings when the light is slowly dimmed for moments of the scene. The lowlight gives the scene an intense feeling of inconspicuousness.
While an audience can only feel so joyful when the realize Bruno isn’t like his father, they are left breathless when what’s left to come. Mark Herman did a phenomenal job in showing the impact not only the war had on families but the torture the genocide caused. After you watch the movie remember where it all begun, wishing of being in your pajamas all day, having the biggest yard to play in and only being separated from your best friend by a thin wire fence.
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