" As for Darkness? I invented Darkness: . . . . . Adolf Hitler! "

Rating: 9/10 (30 May 2010)

The world of the Nazi machine was driven in one and only one direction, towards hell. There are few films which can accurately describe or even come close to the 'Final Solution' or the full horror this maniacal regime created. In this film " The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas " director Mark Herman and writer John Boyne have in their own way taken their audience to the precipice which was the Holocaust and allows us a chance to feel it's monstrous presence. The story as taken from the Boyne novel is of a German Officer (David Thewlis, superb acting) who with a promotion is assigned to be the Commandant of Aushwitz Concentration camp. There his innocent son Bruno (Asa Butterfield) befriends a Jewish boy, named Shmuel (Jack Scanlon) who is the same age. Unknow to his family, Bruno becomes curious as to the real world behind the barbed wire and decides to learn more. The movie has a slow, but ever serious gravity which pulls the audience into the Nazi world behind the wire and it's drama is assured once we are confined within it. A must see film for anyone interested in living the nightmare. Highly recommended! ****