Major Themes of the (La Vita e Bella) Roberto Benigni - Movie Review Example

Bravery is one of the major themes of the movie. The main character, Guido, is a simple Jewish man living in Italy in the 30s. Guido is perseverantand very charismatic, important characteristics that make it possible for him to marry the woman of his dreams, Dora. Dora was about to get enganged to a civil servant, with the consent of her aristocratic and non-Jewish family, when Guido literaly steals her away. In my opinion, that was his first act of bravery. He was not intimidated by the fact that Dora came from a wealthy family and that both came from an unequal social situation.

They had a son some years later and then the World War II began. Guido, his uncle and his son Joshua were forced to go to a concentration camp on Joshua's birthday. Guido created then a fairy tale in order to keep his son from suffering. He pretended that everything was only a game and they had to score high in order to get the first prize. Even hurt and tired of working all day long carrying heavy metal pieces, he tried to keep a good mood in the presence of Joshua. His attempt to mask the reality was actually a real struggle to keep his son under control and consequently alive, since it was known that children and old people had been sent to the gas chambers.

He also created situations that would put him in danger only to keep the fantasy and the safety of his son. Dora was also very brave. She is not Jewish, so her name was not in the list of those who were to be taken to the camp. However, she demanded to go to the same camp as her husband and son. Guido was aware that Dora has been sent to the same place and tried to reach her in different manners. He made use of a loudspeaker to send her a message in the camp and also played music to her. The major proof of Guido's bravery takes place at the end of the movie.

The war was coming to an end and the Nazis were in a hurry to kill as much jews as possible. As a desperate attempt to save the life of his wife, he dressed up as a woman and began to ask around whether anybody had seen Dora. He wanted to tell her to jump off the truck in which the Nazis were placing the women to be taken somewhere to be killed. At this point, he was caught by the Germans and killed. However, his efforts to protect Dora and Joshua paid off. Both of them were set free by the allies and met each other later on.

In my opinion, the movie is valuable in the sense that it shows the acts that took place during the World War II against jews from the point of view of a common man, a father and a husband. Guido took for himself the harsh task of keeping his family safe, even under unexpected situations. Many people criticized the movie by saying that it did not reflect the reality of what happened to the jews during that time. It may be true that “Life is Beautiful” is not an accurate historical report on the atrocities that took place in the concentration camps by that time.

However, it does regard all the suffering and consequences brought by the Nazi “final solution”. Many scenes reflect exactly what was going on and other scenes clearly showed that Guido really pushed himself not to fall apart and keep provinding his son with a more bearable life.