Writer director Taika Waititi (“Thor: Ragnarok”), brings his signature style of humor and pathos to his award-winning and critically acclaimed film, “Jojo Rabbit” which will be shown exclusively at selected Ayala Malls Cinemas starting January 15.
Nominated for six Oscar Awards including Best Picture, Best Supporting Actress (Scarlett Johansson) and Best Adapted Screenplay, “Jojo Rabbit” is a World War II satire that follows a lonely German boy (Roman Griffin Davis as Jojo) whose world view is turned upside down when he discovers his single mother (Johansson) is hiding a young Jewish girl (Thomasin McKenzie) in their attic. Aided only by his idiotic imaginary friend, Adolf Hitler (Taika Waititi), Jojo must confront his blind nationalism. The film also stars Rebel Wilson and Sam Rockwell.
“Jojo Rabbit” with a screenplay by and directed by Taika Waititi is based upon the book Caging Skies by Christine Leunens. The film offers a sharply funny, yet profoundly stirring, child’s-eye view of a society gone mad with intolerance. Drawing on his own Jewish heritage and his experiences growing up surrounded by prejudice, Waititi (whose mother is Jewish, while his father is Māori) makes a powerful statement against hate with this pitch-black satire of the Nazi culture that gripped the German psyche at the height of WWII. Waititi takes a story almost too appalling to approach with sober solemnity—that of a boy who, like many at that time, has been brainwashed into absolutely gung-ho devotion to Hitler. He then mines from it a dark, mesmerizing comedy that ultimately unravels the toxic ideas of anti-Semitism and persecution of the other. Balancing on a comedic high-wire, Waititi mixes the fury of satire with an insistent sense of hope that fanaticism and hate can be overcome.
Waititi says his hope for the movie was always pure, unabashed disruption. He wanted to upend his own comfort zone but also any notion that stories about the Nazi era have been played out, especially when the lessons of those times are so urgent right now. With nationalism, anti-Semitism and other forms of religious and racial intolerance on the rise, the stakes of grabbing people’s attention felt sky-high.
“I knew I didn’t want to make a straight-out drama about hatred and prejudice because we’ve become just so used to that style of drama,” Waititi explains. “When something seems a little too easy, I like to bring in chaos. I’ve always believed comedy is the best way to make an audience more comfortable. So, in `Jojo Rabbit,’ I bring the audience in with laughter, and once they’ve dropped their guard, then start delivering these little payloads of drama that have serious weight to them.”
Watch “Jojo Rabbit” exclusively at Ayala Malls Cinemas – Greenbelt 3, Alabang Town Center, Trinoma, U.P. Town Center, Bonifacio High Street, Ayala Malls The 30th, Ayala Malls Manila Bay, Ayala Malls Solenad and Ayala Malls Central Bloc.
