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This movie is intelligent and thought provoking as it examines, without judgment, the human capacity for both good and evil in its portrayal of several citizens of a small town in Czechoslovakia during the Nazi occupation. It is rare that a movie be harrowing, funny, sweet, and heart wrenching without being contrived. What distinguishes this movie about wartime loyalties and collaboration with the enemy from well worn cliches is its finely nuanced portrayal of each character. Not every collaborator is deserving of punishment and not every so called resistance fighter is a hero. It is an emotionally rewarding movie and it shows that human behavior cannot be reduced to a Manichean struggle.

What an amazing film. I picked this up from work in a throw away box, lets just say, all the artsy movies were in the throw away box, go figure !, took it home, where it sat on the shelf for months, had no idea of the significance of the film, the Oscar nomination etc. So when I finally put it in the machine, I was totally unprepared. What a fine film, beautifully made, gripping, funny, sad, thought provoking. I did not even catch the religious significance of any of it, still it moved me to tears. This is how life is, nobody is perfect, people do horrible/crazy things to survive. Even the hiding of David is done out of self preservation, not something noble. People doing what they can to survive. I loved this film, and would recommend it to anyone with half a brain. A beautiful, intelligent masterpiece.

1st watched 12/5/2008 -(Dir-Jan Hrebejk): Well executed film about a couple in Czechoslovakia who house a Jewish friend during the Nazi occupation of the country. The storyline is really about how people can stick together despite their differences and this is where it shines. The initial credits start by showing us a strange segment passing thru three years where nothing really happens except the introduction of the Jewish character who is ratted on by a neighbor so that their own family will not be harmed. We then are introduced to the main couple in the story entertaining a Nazi friend. They decide to house the Jewish friend and the conflict begins. The conflict is the real possibility that the Jewish person will be found and the couple will be punished as well as the entire town. The wife is the most stable person while the husband almost takes on some of the nazi's attitudes during the period while they are housing their friend. The movie shows how fragile the entire period was with the fear imposed by the Nazi's and the ability they had in changing the culture to becoming suspect of everyone. The couple want a child but are unable to have one themselves, but then end up telling a nazi that they are unable to house him because the wife is pregnant. The husband then makes the Jewish friend pregnate the wife to cover up for this lie. So, the Jewish character, is in some ways still imprisoned even though he is not in a camp. In the end, the four main characters work together to survive after the Czech's take back over the country and this is how the movie got it's title. The excellent performances and story and the opportunity to visit another time and place are just part of the reason to watch this wonderful movie. Hopefully many others will see this DVD release and this very good movie.

'Life Is Beautiful' is often called a great 'holocaust comedy', but it pales in comparison to this. Life Is Beautiful awkwardly shifts between scenes that are supposed to be funny, and scenes that are supposed to be meaningful or sad or intense, as if Benigni was making a joke, then apologizing for it, then apologizing for being too serious, and making a joke again, and so on. This movie plays it straight pretty much, and everything just works. Particularly the scene with the hands in the bed, and the scene where Josef is taught how to make Nazi-like facial expressions are hilarious. The characterizations are very well done, particularly Horst, the horny scumbag of a Nazi who you get to like in the end. The movie is sometimes surreal. In many scenes the images are very jumpy and distorted, but that shows us what the characters are going through, effectively. The ending is maybe one of the greatest movie endings of all time. It's very surreal, and you can interpret it in many ways. Its abstraction is what helps to make it powerful. When many people create art that has to do with the holocaust, they often go out of their way just to show us that they are making a statement about how horrible the holocaust is, as if theyre afraid that we won't think that otherwise. Even the classic Schindler's List does that, I think. But this movie is a different kind of holocaust movie. It doesn't try hard to show us that the holocaust was bad, but it doesn't neglect how serious the holocaust was, either. The only complains I have about this movie is that it is often slow, and a little confusing at the beginning. It's not a completely perfect movie, but it's definitely a masterpiece of holocaust movies. All the schools that show kids Life Is Beautiful should definitely switch to this.

This 2000 masterpiece is a creed apart from the usual holocaust narratives . Amazing to see that World War II is still a fertile ground for brilliant creations like this one . A rare mix of drama , realism , comedy , suspense and what all ? A wonderful message on how as flesh and blood humans good , evil and the undecided all are interdependent on each other , how we need to realise that there isn't anything pure evil or pure good . 1940 Czech town where the patriot , collaborator ( with the occupying Nazis ) , the hunted , the humanist all coexist and live out the everyday drama of survival against all odds .Finely wrapped in heart wrenching comedy this sure belongs to the league of true classics .Wonderful and brilliant use of symbolism , the strung out pork and the entrapped potential meat Jew , the perambulator cross over at the ghost town street with the hand cart carrying the post conflict rubble ... brilliant strokes of mastery !! A must watch for cinephiles and non cinephiles ... do not ever miss this one !!!