The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas (2008) Review

“The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas” is a film adapted by Mark Herman, from the well known book with the same title written by John Boyne. The story was set during the world war, a young boy Bruno was forced to move from his home in Berlin to a isolated countryside near the Nazi concentration camps with his family, as his father is the soldier in charge of that camp. Bruno a young curious boy loves to explore, and wonders around the area. He then spots the camp, he was not aware that it was a camp and believed it was a “farm” and people wearing striped pyjamas works there(Jews), he went to explore and found the “farm” and became friends with a young boy from the “farm” but they were always separated by the fence. Bruno would travel everyday to the “farm” to play with his friend even though there wasn’t much they could do. Towards the end of the film the Bruno’s friend could not find his father and was worried, Bruno offered to dig a hole under the fence and come into the camp wearing the striped pyjamas to blend in with everyone else, to help him search for his father. Bruno entered the camp without knowing what it really is, they searched around and couldn’t find his father, just as Bruno was going to head home, the soldiers gathered everyone in the camp on a march, both Bruno and Shmuel(Jewish friend) held hands marching with everyone else entering gas chamber not knowing what was going to happen. It ends with the father and mother finding Bruno’s clothes on the side of the fence and figure outs what has happen. The audience watches almost the whole movie through Bruno’s point of view, it is only at the end that we see from the parents point of view to show how they discover that Bruno has entered the camp.


I thought that it was a good but sad movie, we see how a young innocent boy has no boundaries to stop him from being friends with someone just because of different background. It also shows how curiosity can lead to unwanted tragedy. Another thought I had from watching this was that hiding the truth from children isn’t always the best.

The information above was partly gained from the following sites.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Boy_in_the_Striped_Pyjamas
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0914798/