THE ARTS/CINEMA	FEBRUARY 23, 1998 VOL. 151 NO. 8
	It's a Beautiful Life Italian comic Roberto Benigni makes love and laughter come alive in a Nazi concentration camp By GREG BURKE /ROME Nazi death camp provides an odd backdrop for a comedy, but Roberto Benigni makes his living playing oddballs. And the first half of La Vita e Bella (Life is Beautiful) shows the goofy Italian comedian in his element as he woos and wows a woman he calls la Principessa (the Princess). Benigni, best known for his box office hit Johnny Stecchino and his role in Jim Jarmusch's Down by Law, directed the film and stars as Guido, a bookseller living in the Tuscan town of Arezzo during the German occupation. The princess is Dora (Nicoletta Braschi), an elementary school teacher who in addition to being the prettiest girl around also happens to be engaged to one of the local Italian Fascist officials. Through a series of hilarious mishaps, Guido carries off la Principessa from a formal engagement party on his uncle's white stallion. But then the film takes an unsettling turn. Guido's uncle becomes the target of crude anti-Semitic graffiti, which the fun-loving younger man writes off as a joke. Of course, it isn't a joke, and soon Guido's bookshop is tagged a "Jewish store." About 8,000 Italian Jews were deported and died during World War II. In making a comedy about such a horrific event, Benigni left himself open to charges of insensitivity. But he asked Jewish groups to advise him on the screenplay, and the film has been well received among Italian Jews. "It's not Schindler's List and doesn't pretend to be," says Franco Pavoncello, Commissioner for Culture for the Jewish community in Rome. "It's a fable about human values, and how a concentration camp can destroy those values." The film may be full of laughs, but it makes no attempt to hide the horrors of the Holocaust. Guido and Dora have a baby boy, Joshua, and when he's about five he asks his father why Jews and dogs aren't allowed into the pastry shop. Dad explains that people can make whatever rules they want, and that one hardware store in town doesn't let in Spaniards or horses. The game of averting tragedy with laughter has begun. Joshua asks why they let everyone in their bookstore, and Guido promises to be more discriminating: "Tomorrow, we're going to write: 'No Spiders and No Visigoths Allowed'." The stakes rise when Guido and his son are sent to a death camp. He convinces the boy that it's all a great game, and that the winner gets to take home a real tank. Guido explains that the bad guys didn't want to let him play, but he insisted and finally got registered. He shows the numbers on his arm as proof. Benigni is at his best when he pretends to know German and translates the corporal's orders for his son. While the Nazi barks out death threats, Guido turns them into rules for the game. "There are three cases in which you lose all your points," he says. "One: Those who cry. Two: Those who want to see their mamma. Three: Those who are hungry and want some snack. Forget about it!" It may be a cheap trick, using the kid's innocence for a few laughs amid the slaughter, but it works. Joshua plays the game well, and in the end the tank arrives, driven by an American. Life really is beautiful--at least for those fortunate enough to survive.
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