Screenplay:
Taika Waititi – Novel: Christine Leunens
‘Jojo
Rabbit’
is being sold on the novelty of Taika Watiti as Hitler, and maybe this leads
people to take is as a satire on fascism. But it seems to me that although it
has satirical elements, it is far more akin to the magic-realism and the child’s
fantastical interpretation of reality that’s rampant in the bildungsroman genre:
‘Celia’, ‘Class Trip’, ‘Alice in Wonderland’, ‘Afraid of the Dark’, ‘A
Monster Calls’, etc, etc.
RobbieCollins is voracious in his criticism of ‘Jojo Rabbit’, feeling it and Waititi
are not up to the task of acknowledging the full horror of the Holocaust, that
it only acknowledges these horrors by trite sentimental symbolism
such as CGI butterflies and carefully rendered frames of shoes. And I can
appreciate where he’s coming from, but in this case I believe there is a
misreading: as sentimental as these moments are, they are associated with Jojo’s
loss and not the Jewish experience; the Holocaust is acknowledged in the girl’s
brief monologue about her family. Of course, the Holocaust is in the background
of everything although what’s surely what’s at stake is Jojo’s natural goodness.
Collins’ feels the Nazi characters here are too cartoonish and therefore
inadequate and objectionable as responsible representations of murderous fascism.
Taika Waititi will not be troubling the satire Chris Morris for Waititi’s approach
is far more irreverently scatological, but this is about a child’s small-town interpretation
of the experience, far removed from the truth of what’s going on and absorbing
the propaganda because it seems cool and fun.
And it seems to me that
this is not a kids’ film and that an adult audience knows what’s at play here;
that the surface is all a child’s perceptions and we recognise the reality beneath
that, and that’s where the unease, humour and tragedy all work. The audience
doesn’t need to be educated. For example, it’s in the way we can feel both
deeply uneasy and amused that Jojo’s jubilant Seig Heiling through the town
resembles a kid pretending to be an aeroplane.
It is surely obvious that
Rebel Wilson’s character is psychotic and damaged right from her horrific-humorous
declaration that she has birthed eighteen kids for the cause. Sam Rockwell’s character,
Captain Klenzendorf, is a little more complex to parse, obviously a jaded
soldier discarded to a small town to bring Nazi influence to its kids. Although
he helps Jojo and doesn’t seemingly buy wholesale into the doctrine, he’s perhaps
seemingly heroic to the kids but also wanting to absurdly dress himself as such
to fight off the allies in a blaze of glory. Klenzendorf swings between doing
good for our protagonist and yet, no matter how much he truly adheres to it, facilitates
fascism. He’s conflicted. Stephen Merchant represents the Gestapo as a caricatured
black-clad, thick-accented menace whose comment about people reporting hiding
Jews which turn out to be mould behind the freezer isn’t funny, but more an indication
of the character’s contempt and dehumanisation of Jews.
Roman Griffin Davis is
fully engaging as Jojo, delightful, brattish and scary as he begins discovering
empathy when he finds his mother is hiding a Jewish girl in the house. Both Scarlett
Johansson and Thomasin McKenzie are effortlessly rich, defiant and vulnerable, easy
gateways to pathos and emotional engagement even as Jojo is all over the place and
everyone else are caricatures to the boy. Waititi is fun enough as a vaudeville
Hitler, but despite being the face of the film, he takes second place to much
else and recedes into hectoring bullying as the film gives way to darker
experiences.
They’re speaking German
as accented English, but however outdated this may be now, it speaks to the
light comedy rather than funny accents. The aesthetic uses incongruous music
and there is a scruffiness that allows all the criticisms in. There’s always
been the kind of slightly shambolic edge to Waititi’s work, a tonal see-saw,
that prioritises the emotional and entertaining over perfectionism; a flavour
that seems to me to be uniquely Australian. ‘Jojo Rabbit’s emotive agenda
takes more and more precedent so that it’s the dramatic resonance you are more
likely to remember than the comedy. It ends with dance-moves – that surely are
too modern – just as they are getting warmed up to new freedoms and possibilities.
The final moments are perfectly pitched: although upbeat in effect, it doesn’t
compromise the darkness and doesn’t promise an idealist future. And, although
incongruous music choices are all the rage, using Bowie’s German-language ‘Heroes’
seems to me to be the correct pick, if you are going to use it.
