A Moving Example of True Love In Reality and How Precious Life Is

Rating: Null/10 (9 January 2004)

Contrary to the comments of many, this is not a Holocaust movie;
anyone who wants to sit through 2 hours of unspeakable bestiality,
suffering and horror needs therapy. If you want to see the reality of
the Holocaust, watch actual film footage of naked bodies of
innocent men, women and children being bulldozed into mass
graves, as I have done because I am a historian who wants to see
the truth; or visit a Holocaust museum and speak to a survivor, as I
have done also. By now we should all know the reality of what
happened, which can never be convincingly depicted by actors or
sets in a movie. The survivors I spoke to dwelt on the human spirit,
survival, love, and even forgiveness of the Nazis involved. Most
comment that the movie is split into halves, but its theme is Love
in the fullest meaning of the word, and this gives the film total
continuity. More than half of marriages now end in divorce and
leave children with one parent, many of the other marriages are
unhappy ones, all leaving children scarred, not to mention the
prevalence of child abuse. This film is about how love can
blossom in good times and bad. The wife didn't run away, she
wanted and needed to follow her family, the husband used is
inventiveness and humour and most of all his love for his wife and
child to protect the son against all odds, and communicate to his
unseen wife that he and their son were alive; all of this because of
Love, not romance or sentimentality or sensuality as love is too
often portrayed, usually ending in disappointment, separation and
another search for Hollywood love or "romance". The movie is
intelligent and assumes we know the real Holocaust and never
attempts to be historical, apart from the brief view of a mass grave
just as a quick reminder to us of the true horror, its message is
love pure, in its joy as well as longsuffering and pain. Many will
attest that life is beautiful even more after brushes with death, and
the film is mainly centred on the son, who for the rest of his days
will never forget his parents love and attention, and the protection
his father gave him, allowing him to appreciate that life is truly
beautiful and to pass his experiences onto others and his own
family.