The Boy in The Striped Pajamas -a review

The boy in the striped pajamas 

Hamish & I watched Boy in the striped pajamas last night

I cried again !

Most of my children were mortified …citing that he would be traumatised.

Only one thought it was a good idea to share this movie with him at 9 years old.

He was saddened by it ….

But

Before we watched it, I asked him to watch the trailer. I also gave a brief explanation of the film and explained that it was a very sad story, one in which I cry often.

Why I let him watch it …..

Last year we started learning about world War 2 and I introduced an age appropriate explanation of how the Nazi people treated the Jews during the war.

We’ve read the Diary of Anne Frank and several other children’s stories set during World War 2 so he was already familiar with the topic of the Holocaust.

We also normally discuss current affairs in our day to day life and he has already sn understanding of hard topics like  …

• Covid
• The Ukraine/Russian war
• The current genocide withPalestine/Israel
• Apartheid
• Gender based violence
• The daily atrocities that come with watching the news, scrolling TikTok0 and conversation with us.

Compared to these the boy in striped pajamas is a sad, subtle explanation of a horrendous time.

Things I did to ensure that he wasn’t infact traumatised and that he comprehended what he was watching ….

We spoke about the movie, scene for scene and I offered explanations and deeper insite where needed.

We stopped the movie often, so I could check both if he had questions as well as how the film was affecting him emotionally.

I explained terms like propaganda and we spoke about how the Jews were being treated, how the young boys felt, etc

I asked him his opinion often

He anticipated the ending of the movie and so was mentally and emotionally prepared for what happened.

We spent some time afterwards talking about the movie, our thoughts and opinions.

Things that upset him …

He was upset at the treatment of the Jewish slaves and prisoners . It helped that the movie depicts that not every German citizen believed in Hitlers actions and I was able to point this out at several parts in the movie.

He was equally upset when he realized what the smoke in the chimney was but most saddened when the boy betrays his little friend and no longer appears at the fence.

Seeing children hurt by an adult was another topic that came up as well as how the propaganda had lied to most people and how many didn’t fully comprehend the events in the concentration camps.

Overall he thought it was a sad movie but wasn’t sorry he’d watched it.

If you haven’t seen the movie yet it does have an age restriction of PG13

Synopsis

During World War II, 8-year-old Bruno (Asa Butterfield) and his family leave Berlin to take up residence near the concentration camp where his father (David Thewlis) has just become commandant. Unhappy and lonely, he wanders out behind his house one day and finds Shmuel (Jack Scanlon), a Jewish boy of his age. Though the barbed-wire fence of the camp separates them, the boys begin a forbidden friendship, oblivious to the real nature of their surroundings.