{"id":19401,"date":"2019-10-31T15:08:59","date_gmt":"2019-10-31T22:08:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.cinemastance.com\/?p=19401"},"modified":"2019-10-31T15:08:59","modified_gmt":"2019-10-31T22:08:59","slug":"jojo-rabbit-is-a-unique-satire","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cinemastance.com\/?p=19401","title":{"rendered":"JOJO RABBIT is a Unique Satire"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Over the past several years, New Zealand\nwriter\/director\/performer Taika Waititi has slowly and steadily earned a large\nfanbase thanks to his exciting work on What We Do in the Shadows<\/em>, Hunt\nfor the Wilderpeople<\/em> and Thor: Ragnarok<\/em>. His latest, Jojo Rabbit<\/em>,\nis one of his boldest and most eccentric pictures, mixing satire, slapstick and\ndrama in equal measure. Admittedly, the humor is hit and miss and the\nconcoction won\u2019t appeal to all. Yet, after a bit of time, this reviewer found\nhimself gradually won over by the story, characters and a couple of grimly\namusing moments. The movie certainly isn\u2019t quite like any other war picture out\nthere. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Jojo (Roman Griffin Davis) is an awkward ten-year old German\nboy in the Hitler Youth who has succumbed to the propaganda around him, idolizing\nthe Nazi party so much that his imaginary friend encouraging him is none other\nthan Adolf Hitler (Taika Waititi). When some kids in the program tease the boy\nand an accident occurs, he is sent back to his mother (Scarlett Johansson).\nAfter discovering a Jewish girl named Elsa (Thomasin McKenzie) hiding in the\nwalls of their home, Jojo comes to the conclusion that turning her over to\nauthorities could result in the prosecution of his mother and perhaps even himself.\nAs Jojo struggles with the situation, his interactions with Elsa become less\nantagonistic. The child soon realizes that blind patriotism isn\u2019t necessarily beneficial,\nand the information told about the so-called enemy is inaccurate. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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This sounds more like a drama than a comedy, but early\nsections of the feature are played entirely for laughs as we see the world\nthrough the child\u2019s eyes, conversing with an infantilized version of Hitler created\nby a prepubescent mind. The Hitler Youth spout ridiculous tales about Jewish\npeople, but don\u2019t seem competent enough to pose a threat to anyone but\nthemselves (and the adults leading them aren\u2019t much more competent). Witnessing\nthese blunt kids surrounded with disturbing Nazi party imagery does highlight\nthe absurdity of the leaders and their values. At this point, the movie is\nessentially a running series of verbal and slapstick gags. A few of them earn\nlaughs, although not all of the early jokes on display lands.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Still, the older supporting cast do manage to sell their\nmaterial. Rebel Wilson gets in a few good lines, blurting out increasingly ridiculous\nfallacies about the Jewish people. Other standouts include Sam Rockwell as an\ninjured captain demoted to training the kids. He gets mileage out of masking\nhis character\u2019s horrible ideologies and braggish tendencies to cover for some\ngrave doubts and concerns about the future. This results in the occasional\nmoment of humanity between himself and the kids. Stephen Merchant may have both\nthe film\u2019s most tense and funny scene as an oddly threatening Gestapo agent who\narrives to search Jojo\u2019s home.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Of course, Jojo\u2019s surreal fantasy world must eventually\nbreak down and the character is forced to contend with the reality of the\nsituation and the true nature of war. Later sections, when the movie introduces\nreal danger and gets to the heart of its themes of how a young person desperate\nto belong can be tempted into an awful movement (while still providing a darkly\nhumorous observation or two along the way), is actually when the film is at its\nbest. Either that, or it just took a little longer for this reviewer to get onto\nits wavelength. The final act does also manage to pull its many odd elements\ntogether effectively. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Truthfully, this picture isn\u2019t going to work for everyone.\nIt\u2019s a difficult sell to present a horrific part of history through a kid\u2019s\neyes with plenty of jokes and some viewers will have difficulty processing the\noddball approach to depicting a fascist regime. Yet despite some scattershot\nhumor and a few moments that don\u2019t quite land perfectly, this reviewer found\nhimself impressed enough overall to give it a recommendation. Jojo Rabbit<\/em>\nis a brave and unique attempt to meld dark humor with a terrible chapter in\nhistory, and moviegoers who enjoy the filmmaker and those who are patient\nenough to endure the more awkward elements won\u2019t easily forget this picture.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Over the past several years, New Zealand writer\/director\/performer Taika Waititi has slowly and steadily earned a large fanbase thanks to his exciting work on What We Do in the Shadows, Hunt for the Wilderpeople and Thor: Ragnarok. His latest, Jojo Rabbit, is one of his boldest and most eccentric pictures, mixing satire, slapstick and drama […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":19406,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[197,4660,5213,9214,10956,10957,10958,10959,17306,17693,17752,19060,19515,22785,23969,24534],"class_list":["post-19401","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-movie-reviews","tag-197","tag-comedy","tag-dark-comedy","tag-hitler","tag-jojo-rabbit","tag-jojo-rabbit-film-review","tag-jojo-rabbit-movie-review","tag-jojo-rabbit-review","tag-roman-griffith-davis","tag-satire","tag-scarlett-johansson","tag-stephen-merchant","tag-taika-watiti","tag-thomasin-mckenzie","tag-war-movie","tag-wwii"],"blocksy_meta":{"styles_descriptor":{"styles":{"desktop":"","tablet":"","mobile":""},"google_fonts":[],"version":8}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cinemastance.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19401","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cinemastance.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cinemastance.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cinemastance.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cinemastance.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=19401"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/cinemastance.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19401\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cinemastance.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=19401"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cinemastance.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=19401"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cinemastance.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=19401"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}