The success of Markus Zusak’s novel, The Book Thief, was a surprise. Narrated by Death, and telling the story of tweens in Nazi Germany without softening the horrors and abuses suffered, it was not a title expected to fly up the best-seller list. Yet the book’s overarching themes of the joys of living and the triumph of the human spirit over adversity seem to strike a chord in readers young and old alike.
Adapting a much beloved book to the screen is always risky, but the filmmakers have done a fine job of capturing the essence of the story and of externalising its innermost themes.
The film follows Liesel. After the death of her brother she is sent to live with kindly strangers, Hans and Rosa Hubermann, in a small village outside of Munich. Among her meagre possessions is a book, the only one Liesel has ever owned – yet she can’t read. This earns her the ‘dumkopf’ label from her classmates at her new school. Determined to learn she enlists the help of kindly Hans. With her love of words firmly in place, Liesel becomes so addicted to books, she begins ‘borrowing’ them everywhere she goes.
Which is not far. The entire story plays out in the village which changes dramatically as the Nazis sweep through, closing stores owned by Jewish merchants and recruiting the football-playing children from the streets. When the Hubermanns take a desperate Jewish man into their basement for two years, his sanity is kept intact by hearing Liesel’s descriptions of the world outside, and by her reading to him from her ‘borrowed’ books.
Because the narrator, Death, is fascinated by Leisel, she remains the focus of the film. So it’s lucky that the filmmakers found an actress as fine as Sophie Nelisse to play her. She is ably supported by Geoffrey Rush as Hans, a role that shows a very different side to the actor. But it’s Emily Watson who really shines. Her Rosa is all bluster and bad temper on the surface, while hiding a soft heart and an aching desire for something better in life.
So it’s just a shame the young boy who plays Leisel’s friend and almost-love-interest is not convincing; his performance takes you out of what is otherwise a very involving and emotional film.
6/10
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