This movie is too good to be merely discussed in passing for my write-ups on “Our Beloved Summer.” It was released 1997 in Italy and 1998 in the US. Although it’s already 25 years old, its core themes are enduring. Some of the scenes, I found eerily relevant in my world which has been hyper-polarized by Covid and politics.

Take for instance this scene with the “No Jews and dogs allowed” signage. The child, Joshua, is contemplating a cake in a store window. Like a child, his eyes are drawn to the pretty frosting on the cake. But his dad, Guido, can see both the lovely cake AND the big ugly sign on the window that reads “No Jews and dogs allowed.”

Joshua: Can we buy this for Mommy?
Guido: (quickly deflecting) How much does it cost?

He knows they can’t enter the store because they’re Jews. But instead of letting his son know that they’re barred from entering the story because of their race, he uses the price of the cake as an excuse.

Joshua: Fifteen lire.
Guido: It’s a fake. It’s probably a fake cake, like your tank. Let’s go, Joshua.

I agree with Guido. The beauty of the cake is fake. Its ugliness is there for all to see. Although it isn’t decorated with a swastika, the cake represents an irrational hatred for a group of people. Guido wants to shield his young son from this ugly truth without teaching him to hate these people.

Joshua: (spotting the sign) “No Jews or dogs allowed.”
Guido: Let’s go, Joshua. Let’s go.

That sign hits home for me. We have designated a new group of people as outcasts, pariahs, and misfits. They are the unvaccinated people.

The ugly truth is covid mandates and vaccine passports aim to marginalize a certain class of people — just like the store sign. We have replaced the Jewish people with the unvaxxed people. We have determined that they *should* be denied public spaces, classroom access, employment, medical services, and even common courtesy. This ugly rhetoric vilifying these unvaxxed people dismays me, and I am triple-vaccinated.

It has got to stop.

Joshua: Why aren’t Jews or dogs allowed to go in?
Guido: They just don’t want Jews or dogs to go in. Everybody does what they want to.

Yes, it’s good when people exercise their personal freedom. “Everybody does what they want to.” But you and I also know the rights, responsibilities and limitations of exercising personal freedom. Guido knows these, too. He’s keenly aware that a majority of Italians, in claiming their personal freedom, have organized to persecute him and his kind.

However, he also knows that his son is too young to be taught politics, ideologies, “cultural hegemony” and “social constructs.” As a parent, he chooses to delay Joshua’s introduction to the hostility and disharmony in the world. He wants Joshua to have a childhood.

Are there any proponent of “Critical Race Theory” on my blog? I hope not. Educators who espouse that pedagogy in the classroom should take a page out of Guido’s book.

Guido: There’s a hardware store there. They don’t let Spanish people or horses into his store. Further ahead, there’s a drugstore. I was with a Chinese friend of mine yesterday who had a kangaroo. I said, “May we?” “No, we don’t want any Chinese or kangaroos here.” Ehhh, they don’t like them. What can I tell you?
Joshua: We let everybody into our bookshop.
Guido: No! From now on, we’ll write it too. Is there anybody you don’t like?
Joshua: Spiders. What about you?
Guido: Me? I don’t like Visigoths. Starting tomorrow we’ll write “No spiders and Visigoths allowed.” I’m sick and tired of these Visigoths.

This is witty. As an innocent child, Joshua’s image of a Visigoth is most likely a barbarian with the Viking’s horned helmet. But Guido is alluding to the Germans because they’re descendants of the Visigoths. He’s right to be sick and tired of these “Visigoths.” His quip is lost on Joshua. As it should be.

There’s another scene in the film that shocked me because it’s pertinent to the current debate on public education in the US. It’s the scene at a dinner party when the school principal extols the “virtues” of German education. She evinces surprise that, not only is the math curriculum in Germany so advanced, but the instruction is also widespread. All young German students can avail of this “superior” math instruction.

Principal: I’m not talking about Berlin. In the outskirts. Imagine that! Third grade. Listen to this problem. I remember it because it shocked me. A lunatic costs the state four marks a day.

Just an FYI. State means the German government, and mark is the name of the German money during that era. There’s an obvious irony here when the principal says that she’s “shocked.” She’s shocked that a German third grader can handle this kind of math, but she’s NOT at all shocked that the child is being programmed to hate these people.

Principal: (continuing) A cripple, four and a half marks. An epileptic, three marks and a half. Considering that the average is four marks a day…and there are 300,000 patients, how much would the state save if these individuals were eliminated?

While the principal praises the German math curriculum, Dora (Guido’s future wife) is horrified that her supervisor at school can’t see the indoctrination. Helllllloooo, this is Critical Race Theory circa 1930’s.

Instead of constructing math questions with an unbiased data, the German educators were indoctrinating their school children to see the lunatics, crippled, epileptics, the infirm and disabled as a drain on the economy of the state. From an early age, the students are brainwashed to see these categories of people as moochers. They’re taught to hate them.

Dora: (shocked) I can’t believe that!
Principal: That was my exact reaction. I can’t believe a seven-year-old child has to solve this kind of equation. It’s a difficult calculation. Proportions, percentages. They need at least some algebra to do those equations. That’s high school material for us.
Dora’s fiancé: No. All it takes is multiplication. You said there are 300,000 sick?
Principal: Yes.
Dora’s fiancé: 300,000 times four. If we killed them all, we’d save 1,200,000 marks a day. It’s easy.
Principal: Exactly. Bravo! But you’re an adult. They make seven-year-old children do this in Germany! It’s truly another race.

This is wrong pedagogy back then in Germany, and it’s still wrong now in American schools. It’s dead wrong to indoctrinate children to look at the color of the skin as an indicator of their future success, or to single out one group as oppressor and the other as  victim, or to blame themselves for social injustices committed before they were even born.

Those are the two scenes that I found particularly relevant vis-à-vis Covid and US education. If I disregard those two issues, however, these are the themes which I found significant. I’ll refer to them in my writeup for Episode 14.

1. Willpower

Guido’s friend Ferruccio introduces him to the German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer. Ironically, Schopenhauer is known as the “philosopher of pessimism” but Guido uses his philosophy to live a life with optimism and hope.

Guido: (waking his friend up) Hey.
Ferruccio: What? What time is it?
Guido: Were you sleeping?
Ferruccio: Of course, I was.
Guido: You fell asleep while talking to me! How did you do that?
Ferruccio: Schopenhauer.
Guido: Who?
Ferruccio: Schopenhauer says that with willpower you can do anything. “I am what I want to be.” Right now, I want to sleep, so I was saying to myself, “I’m sleeping, sleeping” and I fell asleep.
Guido: Amazing. And it’s simple, too. I want to try too.

Then, he waves his fingers in front of him while he chants, “I’m sleeping, sleeping, sleeping.” Lol. He thinks it’s self-hypnosis.

Ferruccio: Don’t move your hands. You’re not a juggler!
Guido: (stops)
Ferruccio: It’s a matter of thought. It’s serious, and it takes time. We’ll talk about it tomorrow.
Guido: Amazing though.

He tries it on his sleeping friend. He waves his fingers and says, “Wake up. Wake up. Wake up.”

Ferruccio: What is it now? What are you doing?
Guido: It totally works!
Ferruccio: What works?
Guido: Schopenhauer. You know what I just said? “Wake up.” Bam. You woke up. This theory is incredible! How does it work?
Ferruccio: You were yelling in my ear!! That’s why I woke up.
Guido: So should I say it quieter?
Ferruccio: Don’t say it at all.
Guido: It’s deep. You have to think it.

The whole film is about willpower. We see Guido’s willpower to create a beautiful life despite all the challenges, injustices, and sufferings he had to bear, and we come away with the ultimate lesson that life is only as beautiful as we perceive it to be, as we make it to be.

I think, even without learning about Schopenhauer’s theory, Guido is naturally optimistic. He reimagines and rearranges unfortunate events to put them in a better light. But hearing of Schopenhauer allows him to believe that he has the actual power to manipulate the world. He thinks he’s superman with this extra power: Schopenhauer’s willpower. There are three occasions when he consciously adopts the Schopenhauer technique, complete with the finger-waving. The first time is at the opera when he wants to make Dora look at him.

An aside: I had to laugh at the scene here.

I thought his seatmate deserved praises for her Schopenhauer’s willpower. lol. How could she not have been distracted by Giudo whispering in her ear, “Look at me, Princess. Turn around, Princess. Turn around, turn around, turn around”? If I were her, I would’ve turned around and smacked him on the head.

The second time he used the technique is to command the nightstand to move. He knows Joshua is hiding inside to avoid taking a bath. So, he waves his hand and orders it come to him.

Guido: Come, flowers! Come, nightstand! Schopenhauer, willpower. I want the nightstand to come here. Nightstand, come! Stop, nightstand!
Dora: The nightstand seems very dirty to me.
Joshua: (jumps out and greets his mom) Good morning, Princess!

I like how his son picked up not only his nickname for Dora, but also the way he dotes on her.

The third time he used the Schopenhauer technique is to move the German shepherd away from his son’s hiding place. When the German shepherd is pulled away, he breathes a sigh of relief and silently thanks his friend Ferruccio for teaching him the trick. It works.

It’s funny how in the movie, convictions — and delusions — have the same positive outcome.

2. Riddles

Serving as a waiter at his uncle’s hotel, Guido befriends a regular diner, a German doctor named Dr. Lessing. They share an affinity for riddles. Guido answers the first riddle.

Giudo: Obscurity.
Dr. Lessing: You’re a genius!
Guido: (repeating the riddle) “The bigger it is, the less you see it.” Solution? Obscurity. Marvelous! Did you make that riddle up?
Dr. Lessing: No, but you solved it in five minutes. It took me eight days. Obscurity!

Guido gives him a riddle in turn. He says his dad told him this joke when he was a little boy. (Ha! That should have clued Dr. Lessing in. This isn’t going to be profound riddle.)

Guido: Snow White and the dwarves sit down for a bite. How fast can you guess what she servers her guests next?
Dr. Lessing: (astounded) It sounds refined. I want to solve it right now.

I think by “refined,” he meant a “nuanced” riddle. But as I said, Dr. Lessing was overthinking this. It was a meant to be a joke for a kid.

He’s so excited that he doesn’t want to eat the dinner that Guido prepared for him. He wants to focus on solving the riddle. He calls Guido a “genius” for giving him a confounding riddle. After he leaves, Guido explains the joke to another diner.

Guido: It’s a riddle. The answer is “seven minutes.” “Seven seconds” is the solution. The dwarves and Snow White.

It’s because dwarves are little people, and a minute can refer to a small fraction of time or to midget. Guido says, “Dr. Lessing is a physician, a very serious person. But he’s obsessed with riddles. He loses sleep over them.”

The third riddle is Dr. Lessing’s parting gift to Guido. He’s been summoned to return to Berlin, but he can’t resist giving him one last riddle.

Dr. Lessing: I truly enjoyed myself with you. You’re the most ingenious…waiter I’ve ever come across.
Guido: Thank you. You’re the most cultured customer I’ve ever said.
Dr. Lessing: Thank you.
Guido: Goodbye, Dr. Lessing.
Dr. Lessing: By the way, “If you say my name, I’m not there anymore. Who am I?”

The doctor isn’t gone 5 seconds when Guido solves the answer.

Guido: “Silence”! Beautiful! If you say the word, it’s not there anymore. Silence.

The next time they encounter each other, it’s at the check-up at the concentration camp. Dr. Lessing is checking the male prisoners to see if they’re going to be gassed or not. He doesn’t recognized Guido – because of obscurity – so Guido speaks in hushed tones, “If you say my name, I’m not there anymore….silence.” And he remembers, “Grand Hotel. Guido.”

Because of their acquaintance, Dr. Lessing arranges for Guido to serve dinner for the camp officials. Guido is excited because he thinks Dr. Lessing will help him and his family escape. But his hopes are dashed when he discovers that Dr. Lessing only singled him out because he has another riddle that can’t solve. He needs the help of Guido, the riddle genius.

Dr. Lessing: “Fat, fat, ugly, ugly, all yellow in reality. If you ask me what I am, I answer, ‘quack, quack, quack,’”
Guido: (stunned)
Dr. Lessing: “Walking along I go, ‘Poopoo.’ Who am I? Tell me true.” A duckling, right?
Guido: (nodding his head)
Dr. Lessing: Is it a duckling? It’s not! A veterinarian friend of mine sent it to me from Vienna. I can’t send him mine until I solve this one. I thought a duck-billed platypus but it doesn’t go “quack, quack, quack.” A duck-billed platypus goes ‘pfft.’ I translated it into Italian for you last night. Well, what do you say? Everything points to a duckling. Help me. For heaven’s sake, help me. I can’t even sleep.

His agility at solving riddles tells me three things:

a. He’s a creative thinker.
b. He knows more than he lets on. Although he may sound like foolish or naïve, he uses logic and critical thinking to take advantage of a situation.
c. He’s observant and perceptive about the truths of life. He isn’t a simpleton.

But what do the riddles tell me about Dr. Lessing? He lacks self-awareness.

The first riddle, for instance, reveals his mindset. He admires Guido, calling him a genius and the most ingenious waiter. But there he is killing people like Guido because he thinks they’re inferior. He and his fellow Germans are committing so many atrocities that they’ve normalized them. They no longer see the monstrous acts as such because they have accepted them as ordinary behavior. Dr. Lessing’s obscurity is what Hannah Arendt called “the banality of evil.”

Same thing with the second riddle. For the Jews that he’s inspecting, Dr. Lessing does have the power to silence them forever. He calls them by name and determine whether the person goes to the gas chamber or not. “If you say my name, I’m not there anymore….silence.”

As for the last riddle, the answer isn’t revealed in the movie. But I think the solution is a Jew. I think that the screenwriter is alluding to the “Final Solution to the Jewish question.” The phrase, “Final Solution,” is coined by the Nazi German leaders for their policy to solve their Jewish problem with genocide.

That’s why I think the riddles are important in this drama. They aren’t merely for comedic effect; they give an insight into the characters and a preview of the situation they’re in.

3. Silence

Aside from the riddle, silence is also mentioned in the beginning. Guido and his friend arrive at his uncle’s mansion to hear glass breaking. As they rush inside the house, three men run out of their uncle’s home, laughing. They find Guido’s uncle on the ground and Guido helps him up.

Uncle: Barbarians.
Guido: Who were they?
Uncle: Barbarians.
Guido: Why didn’t you cry for help?
Uncle: Silence is the most powerful cry.

But in my opinion, silence has four different meaning this movie.

a. Silence means stoicism as shown by Guido’s uncle. He’s been attacked in his own home, but he quickly puts it aside so he can welcome Guido and his friend and leave to attend to his hotel.

This silent stoicism is also displayed by Dora as she rides the taxi alone to the train station.

German: May I help you?
Dora: There’s been a mistake.
German: What mistake?
Dora: My husband and son are on that train.
German: What’s your husband’s name.
Dora: Guido Orefice.
German: (looks at list) Joshua Orefice and Eliseo Orefice are on that train too. There’s no mistake.
Dora: (quietly) I want to get on that train too.
German: (orders the train to depart) Go back home, ma’am.
Dora: (raising her voice) I want to get on that train. (louder) Let me get on that train!

The train is ordered to stop, and silently, she gets onboard the train.

b. Silence means complicity as shown by Dr. Lessing. His silence and inaction in the face of much evil show that he consents to the atrocity.

c. Silence means resignation as shown by people riding in the truck. Only Guido puts on a positive spin so his son Joshua won’t be scared on the ride. The rest of the passengers know that they’re being sent to the concentration camp.

d. Silence means survival. To ensure that his son survives, Guido concocts quite a few silent games.

Like the time Joshua is called to join the German kids in the dining hall. Guido has to make up a game on the spot.

Guido: Holy smokes! She saw us!
Joshua: Are we out?
Guido: She’s coming for you. Not it’s time for the “be quiet” game. You’re never to speak. Swear it!
Joshua: (promising)
Guido: They all talk strange. You can’t understand a word. If we get through this, the first prize is ours. They’re rounding up everyone in first place. It’s the silence game. Not a word, got it?

One of his last games with Joshua is to hide him in a box. He tells them that the guards are looking for them to stop them from winning the game.

Guido: Look how mad they are! Furious! You see? They’re looking for you. Just for you. All this is over you! You’re the last one. The last one to find. They’re even looking under the rocks. The game is over tomorrow. They’ll give the award. If they don’t find you tonight, it’s worth 60 points.
Joshua: How many points do we have?
Guido: We’ve got 940 points. Plus 60?
Joshua: A thousand!
Guido: First place! We win! They’re looking all over the place for you. No mistakes tonight. This is it! Go hide in the box, quick.

Then, once he’s safely installed his son in the box, he returns to him to borrow his little sweater and a blanket. He wants to contact Dora to warn her not to get on the truck. But he needs to disguise himself as a woman. He knows he’s doing something very risky, so he gives Joshua one final instruction in case he doesn’t return.

Guido: Are you cold?
Joshua: No.
Guido: Give me your sweater then. I’ll throw it on a tree and put them off track. They’re looking all over for you! Everybody’s yelling, “Where’s Joshua?” They’re even cursing. They’re really, really mad. No one will find you. Bye now. I’ll be back later. Listen, Joshua. If I’m really late coming back, don’t you move. Don’t come out. You’re not to come out until it’s completely quiet, and nobody’s in sight. Just to be safe. Say it.
Joshua: I won’t come out until nobody is around.
Guido: (kissing him) Good boy.

Those are his last words to his son.

When he’s captured, he sees Joshua watching him worriedly from his hiding spot. But he gives him a wink as a signal, and marches off like a clown to make him giggle. Silently, he’s telling Joshua that all’s well and that he shouldn’t be frightened to see his dad being led away by a German soldier.

It moves me that Joshua’s last sight of his dad is a comical one.

4. Preservation of Innocence

In my opinion, this film wouldn’t stand the test of time if it were simply another Holocaust film. It would have been replaced by another documentary, another historical fiction, another tearjerker. Moreover, it would have lost its appeal to a majority who aren’t Jewish because they would find the subject unrelatable. Unfortunately, their myopic vision wouldn’t allow them to see the strains of Nazism and Fascism creeping in government policies, like the examples I gave earlier on Covid and education.

What made this movie enduring and universal is its message on preserving the innocence of the children.

Joshua is five years old. On his fifth birthday, the Nazi truck arrive at his house to take him, his father and great-uncle away to concentration camp. Guido doesn’t have a Jewish army to fend off the Germans, but he does have a fertile imagination to create a beautiful world for Joshua while living in the camp. He saves his son not only from physical harm, but also from the mental and emotional trauma of the Holocaust.

When they arrive at the concentration camp, he convinces Joshua that they’re all in a competition to win a real tank, not toy tank. The first person to reach 1000 points gets the tank. Although he doesn’t know German, he volunteers as the translator for the German officer so he can translate the camp rules to game rules for Joshua.

German: You’ll only hear what I’m going to say once.
Guido: The game starts now. Whoever’s here is here, whoever’s not is not.
German: You were brought to this camp for a reason…
Guido: The first one to get a thousand points win. The prize is a tank!
German: To work!
Guido: Lucky him!
German: Any act of rebellion will be punished by death. Executions will occur in the square. You will be shot in the back.
Guido: Everyday we’ll announce who’s in the lead from that loudspeaker. The one with the least points has to wear a sign saying “jackass” right here on his back.
Joshua: (covers his mouth in amusement)
German: You have the honor to work for our great motherland and to participate in the construction of the great German Empire.
Guido: We play the part of the real mean guys who yell. Whoever’s scared loses points.
German: The are three things you shouldn’t forget: One: do not try to escape. Two: follow all commands without a question. Three: anyone who rebels will be executed. Is that clear?
Guido: In three cases you’ll lose all your points. One: if you start crying. Two: If you want to see your mommy. Three: if you’re hungry and you want a snack. Forget about it.
German: You should be happy to be working here. Nothing back will happen to those who abide by the rules.
Guido: It’s easy to lose points for being hungry. Just yesterday I lost 40 points because I absolutely had to have a jam sandwich.
German: Compliance is everything.
Guido: Apricot jam.
German: One more thing.
Guido: He wanted strawberry.
German: When you hear this whistle, you must quickly report to the square…
Guido: Don’t ask for any lollipops. You won’t get any. We eat them all.
German: And form two lines.
Guido: I ate 20 of them yesterday.
German: Be silent!
Guido: What a stomachache.
German: Every morning.
Guido: But they sure were good
German: We will rollcall.
Guido: You bet!
German: One more thing. You’ll be working over there in that area. You’ll find it easy to learn the layout of the camp.
Guido: Sorry if I’m going so fast, but I’m playing hide-and-seek. I’ve to go now or they’ll find me.

Later on, he tells Joshua that they were almost disqualified and sent home because the referees of the game couldn’t find their number. But he insisted with the Germans that he’d be given a number, so he was given a shirt with a number on it. Just in case, he had them put his number on his arm, too. And he showed Joshua his tattooed identification number.

In my eyes, Guido is more valiant than any soldier because every single moment of the imprisonment in the camp, he fights to protect his son’s life and innocence.

That’s the whole point of this movie. A grown-up Joshua narrates that it’s his father’s gift for him.

In the beginning, he says, “This is a simple story but not an easy one to tell. Like a fable, there is sorrow, and like a fable, it is full of wonder and happiness.”

During this short narration, a man is walking in a thick fog. For a moment, the fog clears up to reveal the man walking with a little boy in his arms. Then, the fog swallows them up again.

This foggy scene serves two points. First, it creates the appearance that the story is being told about a distant memory. The remembrance is foggy because the event happened during his childhood.

Second, this foggy scene previews the night of the German dinner when Joshua has dinner with the German children. Joshua is carried by Guido back to their quarters, but Guido gets lost in the fog. So he begins to chatter, “Where are we here? I might have taken the wrong way. Good boy, sleep. Dream sweet dreams. Maybe it’s only a dream. We’re dreaming, Joshua. Tomorrow morning. Mommy will come wake us up and bring us two nice cups of milk and cookies. First, we’ll eat. Then I’ll make love to her two or three times if I can.”

It’s a good thing that Joshua is lulled to sleep by Guido’s babbling because Guido emerges from the fog and sees a mountain of naked corpses. I like that even when he’s in shock, he walks backwards, shielding Joshua from the horrible sight.

At the end of movie, the narrator speaks again, “This is my story. This is the sacrifice my father made. This was his gift to me.”

During this narration, Joshua is seen running to his mom shouting, “We won! A thousand points to laugh like crazy about! We came in first! We’re taking the tank home! We won!”

The gift the narrator talks about is his innocence. He’s survived the horrific ordeal thanks to his dad. To me, this is what miracles are all about.

But why is it so important to preserve the innocence of children? Why not just expose them early to the ugly side of life, e.g., the “structural racism,” “white privilege,” and “racial equity,” and all the buzzwords that these Critical Race Theorists are preaching? After all, the children will encounter these issues later in life, right?

Well, this is the reason as shown in “Life is Beautiful.” The world the children grow up in invariably mold and form the person they’ll grow up to become. Indoctrinate the children with hatred and segregation, and they’ll grow up into adults hating and segregating people who are not “their” kind. But teach the children that life is as beautiful as they imagine it to be — and as they create it to be — then they’ll grow up to become adults empowered by a vision to make a better world.

Our hope for a better tomorrow rests on preserving the innocence of children.