Date: Fri 26-Feb-1999

Publication: Bee

Author: DONNAM

Quick Words:

Benigni-Life-Beautiful-film

Full Text:

NOW PLAYING: Benigni's Latest A `Beautiful' Effort

By Trey Paul Alexander III

It's almost unfathomable that a recent film could attempt to make light of

World War II (a la the sitcom Hogan's Heroes ). At least, it seemed

unthinkable until word spread last May at the Cannes film festival about

Roberto Benigni's latest effort, a movie rumored to be precariously close to

an outright mockery of the truths so strikingly conveyed in countless books,

documentaries and films on the Holocaust. Thankfully, Benigni's Life is

Beautiful was not so narrowly classified then, but rather emerged from Cannes

with the Grand Jury Prize, a harbinger of grand accolades -- including seven

Oscar nominations -- to come.

Life is Beautiful , still playing at Bethel Cinema, is set during the latter

years of World War II, and follows the exploits of a cheery, Jewish-Italian

dreamer named Guido (Benigni). He arrives in a scenic Tuscan village with

little in tow but high hopes for the future. Guido lands a job as a waiter --

his uncle, a restaurateur, helps him get set up in town -- with dreams of

ultimately opening up a book store. But his highest aspiration is winning the

heart of a lovely schoolteacher, Dora (Nicoletta Braschi), his "princess,"

with whom he is instantly smitten.

The first half of Life is Beautiful is dominated by Guido's attempt to woo and

win Dora. As the charming Guido pursues his princess, Benigni also wins us,

the audience, by his romantic efforts. As Guido, he is so enraptured by Dora

that he spends an entire evening at the opera with his head turned away from

the stage, gazing dreamily at her, sitting above in the balcony. As a

director, he enchants the audience with a light yet sumptuous touch -- a

sequence involving an automobile mishap in the rain is absolutely precious --

that recall old-fashioned Hollywood move-making.

The movie then jumps forward a few years to when fascist forces move into the

town and cart off Guido and his family (including his uncle and young son) to

a concentration camp. It's a horrific, heartbreaking turn that occurs on the

birthday of Guido's son (wide-eyed, expressive Giorgio Cantarini), leading his

father to allay the child's fears by proclaiming all this to be the

machinations of an intricate game; a planned adventure in which he and his son

are competing against others for the chance to win a grand prize.

At first, this appears to be a shocking change of tone, and at last one

reviewer has said that he was off-put, claiming that the movie treats viewers

like children, shielding us from the Holocaust's horrors just as Guido

protects his young one from the inhumane actions around him. This begs the

question: is the film's impact and purpose blunted by the fact that most of

the atrocities in the second half are, for the most part, only hinted at, or

take place off screen? I think not.

Precisely because graphic sights from the Holocaust have been shown elsewhere

makes it unnecessary for Benigni to convey those images in Life is Beautiful .

To illustrate the tragedies of the Holocaust, the insightful

actor/director/co-writer chose instead to go to great pains -- though "pains"

hardly describes his delicate touch and the film's joyous, almost whimsical,

mood in the first half -- to define his characters and convey their hearts and

imaginations all before their imprisonment. Then, once these ebullient souls

are interred in the concentration camp, our hearts melt at the thought of what

they will undoubtedly suffer. To see Guido bravely mask his own fear for the

sake of his son makes his elaborate play-acting courageous, not foolhardy. In

fact, it becomes a brave statement not to a denial of the Holocaust's ills,

but to one soul's refusal to see its evil overcome or define his or his

family's spirit.