One of the best fictional movie of World War II in my opinion is “The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas” directed by Mark Herman. The movie is based on the book that was written by John Boyne. We view the story from an upper class German boy during the Holocaust. “The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas” has an outstanding storyline, a great choice in actors, and overall it was very effective in showing a different view of World War II. The movie is a must see.

The ending scene is very powerful, starting with general sounds, for example a solider puts something into a box and we hear the diegetic sound of the box closing. We then hear the sound of rain splashing against the mud, and brunos father(played by with just the diegetic sound of Bruno’s mother (played by Vera Farmiga) screaming for her son when they came to the realization of what had happened. Then there is a short second silence before the start of non-diegetic sounds of violin music playing in the background without dialogue from any of the characters, to create sympathy and emotion in the audience.

Mise En Scene is the arrangement of the scenery, props, etc. on the stage on the set of a film (the setting). The way that it is used in this scene has an extremely powerful impact on the viewers, it gives us an insight of what Jewish men, women and children would have seen before they were gassed. It shows the ‘uniforms’ that they had to wear scattered across the floor, the room in the style of a changing room. Outside we can see soldiers walking around with gas masks on their faces which reminds the viewers of where the scene is. The ground of the muddy camp looks hard and cold without a plant or patch of grass in sight, making the seen feel cold and unwelcoming. When the camera shows Bruno’s mother we can see her face through the barbed wire that surrounds the camp. She then reaches down to a prop which happens to be the clothes of her assumed dead son, this is prop is used in such a way that it is mean to trigger a very powerful truly emotional response in the audience which in my case It did.

At the start of this scene we are shown a crane or rig shot (it’s not clear which one of the two), of a soldier on top of the roof of one of the building’s in the camp wearing a gas mask. After figuring out what has happened to her son, there is a medium shot of Bruno’s mother there is an Aerial shot, spiralling up from screaming, before a slow backwards tracking of the ‘changing rooms’ from the gas chamber door showing the piles of ‘pyjamas’ left outside of where they were taken

Examples of how Mark Herman used a contrast of lighting in the two boys completely different lives.

Bright and light colours symbolizing innocence

Dark colours which symbolize sadness/weakness/poverty/death.

Green which symbolizes being happy/healthy/safe.

Warm colours show happiness , love and cheerfullness