Life Is Beautiful (La Vita è bella) Reviews and Ratings



  • October 27, 2009
    This is a horrifying film, but it's also full of life, love, beauty, and humor. I loved it.
  • October 27, 2009
    Comercial! or stupid :|
  • October 25, 2009
    Arrepiante... mas realidade
  • October 22, 2009
    This is a masterpiece that stands out in all of the hundreds of war movies ever made. Who would ever think of trying humour? It gave me goose bumps in every part of my body. So much love, so much strength, so much humanity in a time so inhumane- it's breathtaking.
  • October 15, 2009
    boring. watched it in english
  • October 11, 2009
    the best!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
  • October 8, 2009
    Sangat menyentuh, dan kontras dengan kehidupan yang sesungguhnya. tapi cukup memberi nuansa baru dalam pengekspresian suasana. Roberto Benigni berhasil menjadi actor dalam karakternya.
  • October 1, 2009
    this is what Beauty is!!!
  • September 30, 2009
    sad and beautiful. I cryed like a little girl on the end. The acting was really, really good. Again, sacrificing. God, look at me!
  • September 27, 2009
    I've not seen such a moving, powerful, inspiring and touching film for some time. I can't stop crying at the end of the movie.

    Giorgio Cantarini is not just cute, he is a real child talent. I respect him very much. According to imdb.com, he has only appeared in two motion pictur...( read more)es. In both of these movies the actor playing his father has won an Academy Award for best actor in a leading role.

    Roberto Benigni really changed my perception about life. His performance is two big thumbs up, a very well illustrated homage to the late Charlie Chaplin. Bravo!!!

    As what the tagline have mentioned, Life is Beautiful is "An unforgettable fable that proves love, family and imagination conquer all."

    Rated 3.5 stars by Roger Ebert.

    imdb.com trivias:

    Guido's wife, Dora, is played by Roberto Benigni's real-life wife, Nicoletta Braschi.

    The number on Benigni's prison camp uniform is the same number on Charles Chaplin's uniform in The Great Dictator (1940), the satire of Hitler and fascism.

    Roberto Benigni says the title comes from a quote by Leon Trotsky. In exile in Mexico, knowing he was about to be killed by Stalin's assassins, he saw his wife in the garden and wrote that, in spite of everything, "life is beautiful".

    Roberto Benigni's Oscar for best actor marked only the second time that an actor had directed himself in an Academy Award winning performance. The other was Laurence Olivier for Hamlet (1948)

    Roberto Benigni's Oscar win for Best Actor was the second time a performance completely in Italian had been awarded. The previous winner was Sophia Loren for La ciociara (1960).

    Roberto Benigni was a long-shot to win the Oscar for Best Actor, so was seated mid-row. Being trapped in the center when they called his name he climbed over the seats in front of him to reach the stage.
  • September 26, 2009
    puro llorar conmigo jejej
  • September 20, 2009
    gr8 film...funny in the midst of a sad environment
  • September 18, 2009
    This is one of the most beautiful and touching films ever made. It takes true talent to combine both great comedy and terrible tragedy. Roberto Benigni is brilliant as Guido and as the film?s director. I loved how he accepted his award for best film at the Oscars, it makes me lau...( read more)gh just thinking about it. Brilliant Brilliant Brilliant!
  • September 14, 2009
    Life is Beautiful: I think the title of this film says it all. Roberto Benigni won his first American Oscar for the film, in which he starred, directed, and wrote; quite a repertoire for the foreign actor. The film is set against the backdrop of a pre-conquered Italy in the l...( read more)ate 1930's and early 40's. Life, at that time, was truly beautiful for Roberto's character as he captures the heart of a debutante school teacher for whom he falls madly in love. They are eventually wed and bear a child, just as Italy is on the cusp of being taken over by Hitler's Nazis. The family is soon forced to relocate to a concentration camp.
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    Although some of the subject matter happens to be rather dark, Benigni managed to keep the film light and humorous and somehow forces you to laugh. He told the touching tale with historical accuracy that makes the movie viewer feel like a primary witness to a time not-so-long-ago.
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    This may sound cliché, but "you'll laugh, you'll cry!" Sorry, I had to say it. Life is Beautiful will have you at the edge of your seat fighting back the tears. It celebrates love, love between soul mates, and the love between a parent and their child. It celebrates the survival of innocence during a time that was ravaged by a horrific war. This movie has it all. It is well worth the watch.
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  • September 13, 2009
    This was so moving, a fantastic movie, everybody should watch this. The world is so empty of love that when you see this movie you wonder where's the love nowadays that we don't find it like in "La Vita è bella". What person would do what this father did for his kid, to not let h...( read more)im notice the war all around him?
    Great movie and story.
  • September 5, 2009
    Some people say there's nothing I can do , some others say what is done is done but some people protect the ones who they care for,no matter how hard it is ,because the only thing they use is love!
  • September 5, 2009
    It's a wonderful confluence of mixed emotions, an audacious, heartbreaking essay in shocking contradictions. Yet La Vita è bella is anything but disrespectful. This ingenious, uplifting story of how an Italian waiter shields his son from the most unthinkable horrors of concentrat...( read more)ion camp internment is a breakthrough piece of motion picture artistry, a profound fable about a time in history that would deny folks their fairy tales.
  • September 4, 2009
    La vida es bella!!! Muy buena pelicula
  • August 26, 2009
    Bengini DID NOT deserve any of his Oscars.
  • August 22, 2009
    La Vita è Bella is a very touching movie. This father's love, creative mind and boldness made it possible to hide the terrible truth from his little boy, who didn?t even realised he was in the worst place in the world. It was all a game in which the winner would get a tank.
  • August 21, 2009
    great movie! love it so much!
  • August 20, 2009
    This has got to be one of the most amazing films I have ever seen. It had humor, romance, drama, and tragedy. If you have not seen this movie, then you really have no idea how beautiful life really is. Roberto Benigni is unbelievably fantastic (fantastic enough to win the Oscar f...( read more)or Best Actor for this film and win Best Foreign Film for it). This movie will truly change your life.
  • August 20, 2009
    This film is beautiful. Sweet tale of love and family in the face of the nastiest of evils.
  • August 19, 2009
    This fool is annoying.
  • August 11, 2009
    Such a beautiful movie.
  • August 6, 2009
    beatiful, heartbraking, happy and sad at the same time, a really emotional film.
  • August 2, 2009
    An extraordinary and wonderful fable that celebrates the human spirit. Winner of 3 Oscars for Best Foreign Film,Best Actor:Roberto Benigni,and Best Score:Nicola Piovani. La Vita E Bella is a breathtaking masterpiece of beauty and power,an inspired comedy-drama that combines slap...( read more)stick,satire,and social commentary in a unique and surprisingly effective way. The only other film that comes close to it in beauty and is consistently hilarious,and unforgettable as this one is "The Great Dictator" by Charles Chaplin. Benigni's gift to the world,the story of an irrepressible spirit who refuses to ever give in to adversity! A film for the soul! One of the world's great pictures,a film that proves that love is all you need!!!!
  • July 29, 2009
    my favorite! for all seasons, for all reasons!
  • July 29, 2009
    e' il film piu' bello nel mondo :-)
  • July 27, 2009
    Overrated. Good film anyway.
  • July 21, 2009
    war setting comedy drama
  • July 20, 2009
    kheli kheli jaleb bood ..
    chi begam az in zibatar ?1
  • July 16, 2009
    Life Is Beautiful (Italian: La vita è bella) is a 1997 Italian language film which tells the story of a Jewish Italian, Guido Orefice (played by Roberto Benigni, who also directed and co-wrote the film), who must employ his fertile imagination to help his son survive their intern...( read more)ment in a Nazi concentration camp.

    One of the best movies.
  • July 16, 2009
    Made me cry soo much!! hahahaha
  • July 15, 2009
    es increible, una persona puede cambiar su entorno cuando deja de ser egoista y busca ayudar siempre a los demas... esos son los q dejan una buena huella.
  • July 15, 2009
    I've never really been a fan of slapstick comedy, so with that being said I didn't enjoy the first half of the film as much as the second, which was really powerful. Guido was so brave to protect to his son and pretend like everything was all right, while trying to survive in the...( read more) concentration camps. He leads his son onto a game that he can win. The ending was bittersweet.
  • July 14, 2009
    its was so Beautiful and sad ....
    i love it ....
  • July 10, 2009
    yeah, life is beatiful. it is some kind of religion.
    we can be so strong because of love, because of beauty.
  • July 9, 2009
    Charming and heart-warming; sad and upsetting; entertaining and hilarious. Great acting by Roberto Benigni, but his character was a bit annoying at times. Wonderful music and overall a very good movie.
  • July 9, 2009
    It's a war dramatic foreign film of all the time. Simply awesome!!!.
  • July 7, 2009
    If it doesnt make you emotional your heart is of stone. "Bongiorno principessa"
  • July 7, 2009
    Very moving story with much humour
  • July 6, 2009
    Director: Roberto Benigni
    Country: Italy
    Genre: Comedy / Drama / Romance / War
    Running Time: 116 min


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    Set in late 1930s Arezzo, Italy, Jewish man and poet, Guido Orefice (Roberto Benigni) uses cunning wit to win over an Italian schoolteacher, Dora (Nicoletta Braschi) who's set to marry another man. Charming her with "Buongiorno Principessa", getting the timing perfect every time and whisking her away on a green horse (don't ask!) ensures they soon live together happily in Guido's uncle, Eliseo Orefice's (Giustino Durano) house. Bringing up their 5 year old boy, Giosué (Giorgio Cantarini), the war continues without them noticing until one fateful day when the Germans arrest Guido and his son at the uncle's house during preparation for Giosué's birthday party, and transfer them to a concentraction camp. Dora demands to be taken too, thus Guido is devastated to see his non-Jewish wife board the train.

    Protecting his son from the vile truth, Guido tells Giosué that they are just on a big hoilday, and he turns the camp into a big game for Giosué, claiming that they must win 1000 points to win a real tank and leave. His elderly uncle, however, is on a different "team" and is lead towards the showers first. Guido must complete "tasks" for the camp "moderators" (ie. the Nazi SS), while avoiding the impending fate with everything he can offer. His quick thinking saves Giosué from the truth when a German officer requires a translator. Despite not speaking a word of German, Guido steps forward and makes up the "Regole del Campo" from the German's body language, claiming that tanks, scoreboards and games of Hide and Seek litter the camp, while cleverly stating that Giosué cannot cry, ask for his mother or declared he's hungry, resulting in the loss of the "game", in other words, death.

    Giosué later refuses to take a shower, and unknowingly escapes being gased, so Guido hides him with the help of other Italian prisoners, since there are no other children. Playing messages over the tannoy for Dora, kept prisoner on the other side of the camp, the family build up hope, only to be diminuished by the SS. With the help of Guido's former German friend, Herr Lessing, Guido can hide Giosué amongst the German children, while waiting the German Officer's meals. With the days becoming steadily worse, Guido realises that time is short and that he must make certain sacrifices if his son is ever to see the tanks roll over the hills, and be reunited with his mother. Giosué is pessimistic, and doesn't believe that there are any real tanks or games.

    Hiding Giosué in a junction box for the last time, telling him that everyone is looking for him, Guido jeapordises his own survival to prevent the Germans discovering Giosué, while he attempts to free Dora, giving his own life away at the same time. The Americans break into the seemingly deserted camp the following morning. Giosué immerges just as a tank pulls around the corner. Hitching a lift out, Giosué soon spots his mother and the film closes.
  • July 5, 2009
    I watched this in school, during MCA's. It has to be one of the greatest films that I've seen in a long time.
  • July 4, 2009
    Amazing story about how people's lives can change suddenly. And about love and willing to protect whom you love.

    The way how Guido hides the reality of Jewish concentration place is so touching.
  • June 30, 2009
    My sister persuaded me to watch and it was a good move. What an amazing movie. The little kid was excellent in it I am suprised he didn't go on to do more Films. Loved the way the movie played with your emotions, such a fun film and yet such a sad ending.

Summary


Life Is Beautiful (La Vita è bella) Summary