Life Is Beautiful . Tucson Weekly . 11-16-98

Life Is Beautiful

DIRECTED BY: Roberto Benigni

REVIEWED: 11-16-98

When you heard about the plot to Life is Beautiful you probably thought "Oh no, not another zany comedy about the Holocaust!" Roberto Benigni plays a Jewish bookstore owner in 1940s Italy who, along with his son, is carted away to a Nazi concentration camp. Benigni seeks to shield his son from the terrors by convincing him that they are on vacation, and that the degradations of the camp are actually part of a game. The first to collect 1,000 points through starvation, hard labor and quiet obedience to "the scary men who yell" will win a tank. Unfortunately, the first half hour of this film is an overwhelmingly annoying series of slapstick routines, but once Benigni and family are carted off to the camps the movie achieves a nearly perfect balance between comedy and terror. It's definitely worthwhile to tolerate the first section in order to see something so rare as the second. This week Life is Beautiful was nominated by Italy as its Academy Award submission.

--DiGiovanna

Full Length Reviews
Life Is Beautiful
Life Is Beautiful
Life Is Beautiful

Other Films by Roberto Benigni
The Monster

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