PROVOKR PICK: JOJO RABBIT

BY: Amanda Jane Stern

Famous Jewish comedic-filmmaker Mel Brooks, when questioned about playing Hitler in a 2006 interview with the German paper Spiegel, said “It is an inverted seizure of power. For many years, Hitler was the most powerful man in the world and almost destroyed us. To possess this power and turn it against him — it is simply alluring.” Creating comedy out of personal tragedy has long been a trend for Jewish comedians and filmmakers. Comedy can be used both as a coping mechanism and as a way to steal power from a boogeyman, like how late-night comedy today cuts Donald Trump down to size by parodying him. Now it’s Taika Waititi’s turn to take a stab at a historical big bad. Yes, we covered the trailer for Jojo Rabbit when it first released (which is also above), but now the film is finally here.

Set during the end of WWII in Germany, Jojo Rabbit follows a young boy named Jojo (Roman Griffin Davis), a Nazi fanatic whose imaginary friend is a buffoonish version of Adolph Hitler (Taika Waititi), who must confront his own prejudice when he discovers his mother Rosie (Scarlett Johansson) has been harboring a young Jewish girl (Thomasin McKenzie) in their home. Waititi has said he has always been fascinated by stories told through children’s eyes. On why he decided to tell a story about this time period with humor, Waititi, himself a Maori Jew, said “I hope the humour in Jojo Rabbit helps engage a new generation; it’s important to keep finding new and inventive ways of telling the horrific story of World War II again and again for new generations, so that our children can listen, learn, and move forward, unified into the future.”

Comedy, especially political comedy, exists to make a statement, whether by using current events or the past to serve as a window into our current situation, and Jojo Rabbit is no exception. It is hilarious until it hits you right in the guts and you find yourself crying. To some, turning Nazis and Hitler into the butt of a joke seems tasteless, but to creators like Brooks, Waititi, and many more, creating comedy out of the tragedy of their cultural pasts is a way to take control of the narrative, while still educating about the horrors of the past, and hopefully even propel the future in a more positive direction. We can never move on from the past if we ignore it.

Jojo Rabbit comes out in theaters on October 18 by Fox Searchlight.