Solid family-level film with a light touch but good impact

Rating: Null/10 (8 October 2012)

It is odd to watch this film because all at once I felt it did a good job while also feeling that it was simply nowhere near as horrific as it needed to be. The story sees a young boy move into the country with his family, his father being a senior soldier in Hitler's Germany. At his new home the boy is bored without friends to play with, but meets a young boy on the other side of a fence who is sitting around in his pyjamas; over time they become good friends.
The film is aimed at the family audience; parents with older children who can deal with the subject matter but perhaps are coming to it for the first time. As such it is very well pitched because it does unfold gently and it does explain things and show things in an accessible, understandable but yet still upsetting way. By focusing on the character of Bruno we get this perspective and it allows the rest of the film to be delivered in this same way – through a certain innocence and lack of understanding which comes with being a child. I mostly liked this approach because it is true that nobody is born hating or fearing anyone – these are things we learn or develop and Bruno is sitting in that area before this happens. The downside of this approach is that the film does feel a little softer than the reality and the general delivery seeks to upset but never shock, meaning that visually and tonally the film is a lot gentler than many adult Holocaust films. This is a flaw for an adult viewer, but it is a necessary flaw because it is aimed at a wider audience and as such it works, but it does feel weird to watch the film as an adult (knowing the reality) and yet find it accessible and innocent in its tone.
The cast match this, mostly playing light and allowing suggestion to be their tool. Butterfield and Scanlon are very good; natural and chatty despite the material and convincing as children in the middle of this terrible hate. Thewlis is solid in the father role while Farmiga provides an accessible reaction to the horrors of the reality and as such is a key performance in the film to deliver this. The supporting cast are all decent but really the film is the two boys sitting with only man-made things between them.
Overall this is an accessible and emotionally impacting look at the Holocaust, using the innocence of childhood well. This creates the flaw of being more accessible than the subject really should be in reality and I did feel a certain discomfort while watching, feeling that I shouldn't be finding bits of it easy to watch. This does pay off though by being easier for more viewers and by highlighting the innocence and in the end the emotional impact is the same. Not a perfect film by any means, but one that sets out its goal and achieves it.