The Boy in the Striped Pajamas Review

There are no spoilers in this review.

PLOT: Set during World War II, a story seen through the innocent eyes of Bruno, the eight-year-old son of the commandant at a concentration camp, whose forbidden friendship with a Jewish boy on the other side of the camp fence has startling and unexpected consequences.


THE GOOD: David Heyman. One of the producers of The Boy in the Striped Pajamas is David Heyman. Heyman has grown to be one of those producers that I have a bit of trust in. He's been quite consistent with taking small films and making them look like big budget entertainment. Just look at the wonders he made with the Harry Potter films. I got a chance to see him at the Paris premiere of Goblet of Fire. I'll be perfectly honest by saying that the main reason I watched this film was because it was produced by him. The problem comes when there are six other producers as well. I will talk about that in "The Bad" section.


THE BAD: Unimaginative. There are many moral messages one can gather from WWII films. That's what makes films like that so great. The execution in Striped Pajamas is poor. It's unbelievable, unimaginative, and a real shame. You see what's coming a mile away. The movie is so straightforward and so blatantly obvious that even a turkey could figure it out. There's nothing remarkable about this film, but there could have been and that's what I found most annoying. Please, don't fall for this manipulative manufactured tearjerker.

English. I side with the authenticity complainers of this film and not with the Eberts of this world. I am distracted when I see Nazis speak in perfect English. I made the same complaint with Valkyrie. Now, I don't think the movie could have been much better had it been all in German, but I do think it would have been better if they made the actors use German accents.

Six producers. TBITSP is a perfect example of what happens when there are "too many cooks in the kitchen". Scenes start to not match one another. It seems like none of them really spoke to one another. By the end of the film, I feel like I'm watching a different movie than I was at the beginning. Sloppy.


THE END: Here's the thing that The Boy in the Striped Pajamas proves to me: just because a movie is based on the Holocaust doesn't mean it's going to be good. I would venture to say that The Boy in the Striped Pajamas is one of the worst WWII flicks I've ever seen. The acting from the adults is okay, the cinematography is decent, but almost everything else is bad. I read nothing but rave reviews on IMDb and not one of them is convincing me that this is really a good movie. Everyone just agrees that since it's a World War II movie, it deserves praise. I'm sorry, but that's wrong and I won't agree to it. Don't bother with this one.


DISCUSS: Did you like The Boy in the Striped Pajamas? What are some other bad WWII films? What are your favorite WWII films? Do you like David Heyman's work?