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| Released: |
1998 |
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| Genre: |
BLACK COMEDY
FOREIGN
ROMANCE
CONTROVERSIAL
WAR
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| Origin: |
Italy |
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| Colour: |
C |
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| Length: |
114 |
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PRO Reviews
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| | At Cannes, it offended some left-wing critics with its use of humor in connection with the Holocaust. What may be most offensive to both wings is its sidestepping of politics in favor of simple human ingenuity. The film finds the right notes to negotiate its delicate subject matter. And Benigni isn't really making comedy out of the Holocaust, anyway. He is showing how Guido uses the only gift at his command to protect his son. If he had a gun, he would shoot at the Fascists. If he had an army, he would destroy them. He is a clown, and comedy is his weapon. The movie actually softens the Holocaust slightly, to make the humor possible at all. In the real death camps there would be no role for Guido. But Life Is Beautiful is not about Nazis and Fascists, but about the human spirit. It is about rescuing whatever is good and hopeful from the wreckage of dreams. About hope for the future. About the necessary human conviction, or delusion, that things will be better for our children than they are right now. | | | | (Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times) | | If what you are looking for in a movie these days is uniqueness and originality, look here. Life is Beautiful, a new Italian tragicomedy set in the Holocaust is a tremendously upbeat and very easy to watch little movie. Made by Roberto Benigni, this is a shoo-in for Best Foreign Language film this year... funny yet poignant, sometimes hilarious and often truly touching. It is a simple and yet complex fable about imagination, faith, and most of all a father's love for his child. Benigni is perfect in his role as Guido, perfectly mixing tragedy and comedy, both in his performance and direction. This is the kind of movie that will never be popular, at least not in this country, but deserves to be. It is one of the most entertaining, heartfelt, touching movies of the year. | | | | (Eugene Novikov, Ultimate Movies!) | | That miracle, a film of warmth and wit and horror and pain and majestic beauty that depicts the most unimaginable crime of the century in the language of farce, slapstick and romance. In a year that has already given us the greatest war movie Hollywood has ever crafted, it is one of the greatest films about the civilian experience of war ever made anywhere... The jokes in Life Is Beautiful are among the best comic gags in memory - clean and fresh and filled with magic. But the sentiment the movie evokes is equally new and real. From its raucous opening sequence to its heart-wrenching finale, this is one of the finest films of our time. | | | | (Shawn Levy, Portland Oregonian) | | Some critics have accused Benigni of trivializing the Holocaust, but that is not the case. He uses his character's humor and childlike innocence to instill hope in the face of adversity and the absurdities of war. Here is the true TRIUMPH OF THE WILL. | | | | (Jim Byerley, HBO) | | Though it may seem a tad distasteful, it works - powerfully. | | | | (Christopher Brandon, Rough Cut) | | A wonderful and warm film which had tears streaming down my face. | | | | (Jonathan Ross, Daily Mirror) | |
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, Dora: Nicoletta Braschi, Giosue: Giorgio Cantarini
