I've just finished watching
Life is Beautiful and am going through the most significant hour of any movie - the bit afterwards where it lays down in your head. The film was very well done, as I'd been told. However, I don't think I wlil remember it as a
great film. Far too much things stand out as
implausible, and having a
plausible plot is very important to me. It feels
contrived.
The most important enigma for me was the son. Kids are not stupid. They can pick up
bad vibes as much as any of the rest of us, and they can see through bullshit pretty well, too. The script tries to portay the son as insightful in the way it has him pick out his grandmother. But then he goes along with his father's ridiculous lines about the
death camp being a game. Most of all, there is no way you'd be able to keep a kid caged up in a smelly dormatory that way. How did he and his father survive on food that would have been barely enough for even one mouth? Knowing how easily
bored I was at that age, I refuse to believe a kid could sit patiently in a room
day after day but be still lured by the promise of winning a
prize.
The moment with the doctor confronting the
protagonist in the dining room is very moving, but out of place. It's too cold. It would have felt appropriate in a plot styled something like Heller's
Catch 22, but not here.
I don't know about the history of the region(
Tuscany?). Somebody may be able to point out to me whether or not the timing of his arrest with the end of the war was accurate. It's all very convenient that they only had to spend a few days in the camp.