Life is Beautiful

1997 film by Roberto Benigni

AI overview

"Life is Beautiful" is a 1997 film directed by and starring Roberto Benigni that uses humor and imagination to tell a story set against the backdrop of World War II and the Holocaust. The film is widely regarded as a masterpiece for its unique approach to depicting one of history's darkest periods through a lens of hope and human resilience.

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Film · TMDB

8.4

A touching story of an Italian book seller of Jewish ancestry who lives in his own little fairy tale. His creative and happy life would come to an abrupt halt when his entire family is deported to a concentration camp during World War II. While locked up he tries to convince his son that the whole thing is just a game.

Released: 1997-12-20116 minDir: Roberto BenigniComedy, Drama

Cast

Roberto Benigni as Guido
Nicoletta Braschi as Dora
Giorgio Cantarini as Giosué
Giustino Durano as Zio
Sergio Bini Bustric as Ferruccio
Marisa Paredes as Dora's Mother

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Ratings

IMDb

8.6/10

813,857 votes

Article

Life Is Beautiful (Italian: La vita è bella, pronounced [la ˈviːta ˌɛ bˈbɛlla]) is a 1997 Italian period comedy-drama film directed by and starring Roberto Benigni, who co-wrote the film with Vincenzo Cerami. Benigni plays Guido Orefice, a Jewish Italian bookshop owner, who employs his imagination to shield his son from the horrors of internment in a Nazi concentration camp. The film was partially inspired by the book In the End, I Beat Hitler by Rubino Romeo Salmonì and by Benigni's father, who spent two years in the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp during World War II.

The film was an overwhelming critical and commercial success. Despite some criticisms of using the subject matter for comedic purposes, it received widespread acclaim, with critics praising its story, performances and direction, and the union of drama and comedy. The movie grossed over $230 million worldwide, including $57.6 million in the United States, is the second-highest-grossing foreign-language film in the U.S. (after Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon) and one of the highest-grossing non-English-language movies of all time. The National Board of Review included it in the top five best foreign films of 1998.