Don’t be fooled by that title, this is no twee kids tale. Based on the book by Irish writer John...
Don’t be fooled by that title, this is no twee kids tale. Based on the book by Irish writer John Boyne, it centres on Bruno, the eight-year-old son of a high-ranking Nazi officer during WWII.
Too young to understand the war around him, Bruno is confused when his father’s new job sees them moving to the country and living next to what looks like a heavily fenced farm, tended by people in striped pyjamas. He’s also baffled by the black smoke billowing from the chimneys over the hill. One day, against his mother’s orders, he goes exploring, reaches the ‘farm’ fence and finds another little boy looking back at him from the other side.
Directed by Mark Herman (Little Voice, Brassed Off), this stars Brit thesp David Thewlis, The Departed’s Vera Farmiga and 10-year-old Asa Butterfield as Bruno.
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65 %146 reviewsRotten Tomatoes® rating
84 %114,837 reviewsAudience score rating
15+Age suitabilityChildren & Media rating
"Opening half-hour has some of the best stuff in the movie, walking a precarious line between black irony and showing the war from a totally German viewpoint, without tipping over into gallows humor or parody."
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Variety
Variety"See the Holocaust trivialized, glossed over, kitsched up, commercially exploited and hijacked for a tragedy about a Nazi family. Better yet and in all sincerity: don't."
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The New York Times
The New York Times"The Boy in the Striped Pajamas is not only about Germany during the war, although the story it tells is heartbreaking in more than one way. It is about a value system that survives like a virus."
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Roger Ebert
Roger Ebert"Slightly wooden child's-eye-view of Holocaust becomes an eerie parable about the evil that men do."
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New Zealand Herald
New Zealand Herald"Incredibly insightful and moving film."
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Newshub
Newshub"The film's two levels -- metaphoric and nitty-gritty -- don't mesh until the devastation of the closing sequence, which both indulges in and transcends melodrama."
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Los Angeles Times
Los Angeles Times"Boyne's tale is starkly cautionary, and writer-director Herman handles a difficult topic with great sensitivity, drawing splendid performances from his young actors with David Thewlis and Vera Farmiga and the other grown-ups reliably efficient."
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Hollywood Reporter
Hollywood ReporterThe Boy in the Striped Pyjamas | Details
- Runtime
- 94
- Genre
- Drama, War
- Country of origin
- UK, USA
