Italian Neo-Realism Flipped on it's head...

Rating: 2/10 (15 August 2005)

...And it's skull cracked as it landed. Instead of feeling real in any way, this is the most contrived, artificial thing I've ever seen. Instead of being a powerful portrayal of a problem that touches us all, this is a weak attempt to show people overcoming a threat that is portrayed very badly.
After a somewhat effective opening scene establishing Guido the main character, we start story A. "Guido(who is so poorly portrayed that you will never for a second stop thinking its Roberto Benigni) meets a beautiful woman who has to abort her wedding and go off with him." Forget the fact he is able to meet her only through an extremely belief-straining series of coincidences which really aren't that funny, but the idea that she feels compelled to even cope with, much less love, a guy who flails his arms like he's on fire and speak like a kid on crack to her is impossible to believe.
Story B: the over-hyped holocaust comedy section. People wonder how Guido manages to keep his son in the dark about what's going on around him (which is very questionable in and of itself ethically) The answer is that what happens simply does not reflect the holocaust properly. There isn't the hideous lice problem that existed, offices are left unattended so that Guido can go in them and make a disgustingly sweet moment by playing a record to the camp, piles of dead bodies do not result in the stench simple logic requires they would have, etc.
Forget being indignant, just the irritation was reason enough not to waste your money.