The Book Thief

The Book Thief, based on a popular novel, is kind of a mish-mash of many different World War II tropes, and at the end of the film it proves to be unsatisfying. Directed without distinction by Brian Percival, it strains at the seams with sentimentality, even though it attempts to be unsentimental in its structure.

As with the book, the film is narrated by Death, who was very busy during the Nazi years. He tells us the story of Liesel, the daughter of a woman who is taken away by the Nazis for being a Communist. On the train journey to her new home, her brother dies, and she purloins a copy of a gravedigger's handbook at the makeshift funeral. She doesn't know how to read, but she's fascinated by the book as an object.

Her new parents are an older, childless couple. The mother (Emily Watson), is stern and severe, while the father (Geoffrey Rush) is kindly, and helps her learn to read. She takes some lumps in her first few days, especially when the other children learn she is illiterate, but a neighbor boy takes an interest in her and becomes her friend.

We follow the family over the years of the war, as the children are indoctrinated into the nationalistic fervor and longtime neighbors are dragged away for being Jews. A big part of the plot is when the family hides the son of a old friend (Ben Schnetzer) in their basement. But though there is one moment an officer inspects their basement, there is curiously little suspense over this, and it resolves itself peaceably. Another aborted storyline is when Rush, well over the age of being a soldier, is conscripted.

The other major theme is, as the title might suggest, Liesel's love of books. She is befriended by the wife of the mayor, who allows her to use their library. When the mayor puts a stop to it, she resorts to climbing in the window and "borrowing" them. Again, there is no pay-off to this, and little suspense. The same with a mean neighbor boy--you think he's going to expose someone, or do something threatening, but nothing comes of it.

The end has many deaths, but they are off-screen and hollowly anticlimactic. For as terrifying as it must have been to live through this period, the film takes an almost benign view of things.

I did like some of the performances, especially Rush and Watson. Rush has the easier to role to play, since he's the nice guy, but Watson's is trickier, as she starts as a mean old woman and must slowly thaw out her heart. Sophie Nelisse is fine as Liesel. She reminded me a great deal of Anna Chlumsky, the star of My Girl.