Jo Jo Rabbit: When Satire Falls Flat

A rant that will most definitely contain spoilers BY SYLVIA RANI Jo Jo Rabbit: When Satire Falls Flat Get in, readers, we’re going deconstructing. As a reminder that mass audiences lack critical thought and conflate self-congratulatory politicism with quality filmmaking, Taika Waititi’s Nazi satire “Jojo Rabbit” recently claimed the Toronto International Film Festival’s People’s Choice award. The film follows a little boy, Johannes Betzler (played by Roman Griffin Davis), during World War II as he pursues his dream of becoming a Nazi. Johannes, or “Jojo” idolizes Hitler so strongly that his imaginary friend is none other than the fürher himself. Played by Taika Waititi, the imaginary Hitler is a self-parody, materializing to comfort Jojo in times of need with gleeful childlike lines such as, “That was intense!” He accompanies Jojo as he attends a Moonrise Kingdom-esque Nazi summer camp run by two cartoonish generals (played by Sam Rockwell and Rebel Wilson) where young boys burn books, throw grenades, and learn how to become “real” Nazis. After an accident with a grenade leaves his precious porcelain face with a web of scars and he fails to kill a rabbit on command (hence the nickname Jojo Rabbit), Jojo is disgracefully sent home from Nazi camp. Back in his childhood home, Jojo discovers that his mother is hiding a Jewish girl within his walls. At this point in the film, things begin to get very predictable. Through their conversations and his eventual attraction to this mysterious girl, Jojo realizes that Jews are people too and understands the error of his past ways. His imaginary friend’s visits become less frequent and more intense, and the confused young Jojo begins to see through the lies he’s been fed his whole life. It’s a feel-good tale of oppressor-turned-hero thanks to the beautiful girl who brought out his inner compassion, with a side of shock-factor irony and random bouts of violence. But is this a narrative that we even need right now? The film urges the audience to identify with Jojo. In doing so, the audience is put in the position of seeing Jews as lesser, even with the full knowledge that he will come around in the end. It also places the audience in the eyes of a literal child; a sickeningly sentimental state of mind that absolves people of the responsibility they have for their own prejudices. Centering an adolescent in a film about overcoming internal prejudices is simply too easy—as a child, it’s hard to blame Jojo for his bigoted beliefs, but audiences are eager to applaud the ways he worked to overcome them. And as the presumed viewers of the PG-13 rated flick are people who already see the issues with Nazi ideology (hence the satire), why beat on a dead horse? The film feeds audiences a comforting thought: through individual resistance and shared empathy, people can deconstruct their own learned hate and take down an entire regime. And while uplifting, this idea is naive, crowdpleasing, and surface-level. Satire should be critical, not comforting. It should force audiences to question their beliefs rather than affirm their self-righteousness. The Nazis in the movie are ridiculous slapstick caricatures, and their goofy stupidity combined with their inability to see the wrongness of their ideology enables the audience to see through them. Again, however, we must ask: is this necessary? This portrayal is a vastly inaccurate oversimplification of what actual Nazis were like. These were normal, even smart people, who were operating within a system that threatened their lives and reputations if they were to step outside of it. Many were simply complacent, using their power to enforce bigotry because they could. While their ideology may have been founded on a set of logic-defying principles, Nazis themselves were regular, everyday people, not vastly different from the people in our communities today. The forced humor in the film also asks audiences to divide themselves into those who “get it” and those who don’t. Those who “get it” are so above prejudice, so very woke, that this ironic display of hate is laughable. Those who don’t get it are oversensitive, or even worse, are Nazis themselves. The film positions itself so that a rejection of this humor is to not understand it. The issue isn’t that the satirical image of Nazis is offensive, it’s that satire must be done with intent. The Nazis in Mel Brooks’s “The Producers” were satire but markedly different than Waititi’s shallow, crowdpleasing portrayal. At this point in time, a film about the issues with World War II-era Nazism is redundant and categorically safe. Which is why, despite its provocative marketing and heavy themes, the Disney-approved “Jojo Rabbit” is actually quite tame—a crowdpleaser disguised as a controversy.