I love this film! I kept forgetting to watch it but I’m so glad that I finally did because it is brilliant. It is so fun and comical but also hard-hitting and sad and it just gives a new interpretation of World War II and everything that happened from the aspect of Nazi Germany and a 10 year old boy.

Jojo Rabbit follows the story of a young boy called Jojo who has been indoctrinated into the Nazi way of life and thinking. This all changes however when one day, while training to be one of Hitler’s youth, he is blown up by a grenade and has to move home with his mother where he finds out that she is hiding a Jewish girl in his dead sister’s bedroom.

This begins a whole story of Jojo starting to find out more about the Jewish people and their culture and way of life as well as how his own misconceptions of them have been exactly that, misconceived. Seeing it from the eyes of a 10-year-old boy is absolutely fascinating because you really get a different angle from something so horrific, especially as he doesn’t seem to understand in himself what is really happening and how terrible Hitler really is, especially as we are constantly shown that he sees Hitler as an imaginary friend that is there for him.

This film is a comedy, it has a lot of light-hearted moments and a lot of funny moments too that are so slapstick and weird. Having Hitler as an imaginary friend and everything he spews is hilarious and terrifying at the same time, because you know how easy it is to be indoctrinated into people’s way of thinking just because that information is accessible to you. But I also think the story of Jojo‘s mother, a German woman hiding a Jewish girl in her home to keep her safe and alive knowing that it could end in her downfall and ultimately does, is really heartbreaking knowing that there were good people out there at the time and yet they were punished for just showing a little humanity.

Jojo Rabbit may not be for everyone and I completely understand that because World War II is such a horrific time to think back to. I have watched countless documentaries and films on World War II because I find it so fascinating but I still enjoyed this because it gave a different twist to it. It didn’t take itself too seriously and I think sometimes that’s what you have to do in your darkest times, you still have to find hilarity and funny moments, so while it may not be everyone’s cup of tea for me I really enjoyed it and I do recommend it.

I especially love the ending too. I know some people, as I’ve seen online, had issues with it because it didn’t quite fit with their narrative or how they expected the film to end but I think it ended in the way that was perfectly correct for what it was doing. It encapsulated earlier moments from the film and it really pulled everything together and showed that this dark time was over and people could be happy and free again. It also showed Jojo‘s own character development, from him being a hard Nazi supporter to him then realising that what he thought was correct wasn’t, and that not everything he thought was as it seemed.

What do you think of Jojo Rabbit?

Until next time.

Published by shonaharding

Media graduate with a passion for reviewing film and TV. View all posts by shonaharding