Life is Beautiful

1
Life is Beautiful

• By Roberto Benigni

2
Life is Beautiful

• La Vita e bella
• Came out in 1997
• Roberto Benigni is the main actor, the director
  and the writer.
• At the time the film was made he was the biggest
  star in Italian cinema.
• He is primarily known as a comic actor.

3
Roberto Benigni

• He co-stars with his wife, Nicoletta Braschi
• He is not Jewish and the story is fictional.
• He was born after the war.
• The story takes place in Tuscany where he grew
  up.
• His father was imprisoned in a German labor camp
  (not a death camp).

4
Life is Beautiful

• Won over 70 international awards, including the
  Cannes Film Festival Grand Jury Prize.
• Got 7 academy award nominations, including best
  picture and best foreign film.
• This was the first time a foreign film was up for
  both of those categories since 1969.
• Won 3 academy awards best actor, best dramatic
  score and best foreign language film.

5
Life is Beautiful

• Widely praised by critics and Jewish groups.
• It won awards in Israel.
• Praised by the Simon Wiesenthal center, an
  international Jewish human rights organization
  known for its efforts and successes in bringing
  Nazi war criminals to justice.
• The year this film came out, it was North
  Americas highest grossing foreign film of all
  time.

6
Discussion Questions

• Does the film trivialize the subject?
• Is this a historical document of the Holocaust?
• How does it portray the camp?
• How is it different from the other films we have
  and works we have read?
• Does it have any similarities to other works?

7
Discussion Questions

• What is the purpose of the fairytale elements in
  the film?
• Does the fairytale continue in the camp?
• What do you think of the use of humor in the film?

8
Discussion Questions

• What do you think of the following critique of
  humorous treatments of the Holocaust
• For the past 5 years now, weve been protesting
  and pleading with all concerned to understand
  that if the Death Camps are allowed to be
  commercialized, trivialized, revised and
  desecrated, than the whole Holocaust issue will
  be undermined and it will be a betrayal of all
  who were lost in the Holocaust. Weve been
  calling for these sacred grounds to be returned
  to the Jewish community to do the proper respect
  . . .

9
Discussion Questions

• Critique continued
• . . . for all the victims . . . There is a
  crisis today at Auschwitz with over 300 crosses,
  plus fast food, banking, and post office being
  built there. And if we let them get away with
  any of this, it will spread to every other camp.
  Now the movies want to add humor to the
  Holocaust. The longer the Jewish community stays
  silent, the worse it will get.

10
Discussion Questions

• How is the humor portrayed here different than in
  Jacob the Liar?
• How does the humor make us feel?
• How are the Germans depicted in the work?
• Dr. Lessing is an interesting character. What
  does he represent?

11
Discussion Questions

• What does Guido see when he is lost?
• The theme of not believing comes up in the
  film. What is this saying about the Holocaust?
• What does the narrator (who is the little boy
  grown) up mean at the end of the movie when he
  says, this was my fathers gift to me? What
  was his fathers gift?

12
Discussion Questions

• There is a scene in which Guido is dancing on a
  table in the school. Does the theme of this
  scene remind you of any other movie scenes we
  have seen?
• What did you think of this film?