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Film Analysis of "The Book Thief"

In 1938, young orphan Liesel (Sophie Nélisse) arrives at the home of her new foster parents, Hans (Geoffrey Rush) and Rosa (Emily Watson). When Hans, a kindly house painter, learns that Liesel cannot read, he teaches the child the wonders of the written language. Liesel grows to love books, even rescuing one from a Nazi bonfire. Though Liesel's new family barely scrapes by, their situation becomes even more precarious when they secretly shelter a Jewish boy whose father once saved Hans' life. (Rotten Tomatoes, 2013)

The film started to be interesting when the people throw and burn books in the plaza and the girl, Liesel starts to be suspected by someone to be a communists. After the event where people throw and burn books, the girl Liesel recovers or steals a book from the pile of burnt books. This part makes the film interesting because it stirs up conflict compared to the scenes before, since the scenes before are more of their simple life.

The part of the film I like best is when the foster father, Hans Hubermann is conscripted and needs to leave his family to be in the army. Afterwards a scene showing Liesel trying not to cry and in another scene his wife, Rosa Hubermann crying is shown. It is the part I like best because after Hans Hubermann leaves, it shows how important his existence is to his family. Like from the start of the movie, his efforts serve as a way for Liesel to open-up to her new family, which is them. It also shows how loved he is especially by his wife, Rosa.

My favorite character is Hans Hubermann because without Hans Hubermann their family will not be connected with each other, since from the start the wife does not care for Liesel, but since Hans made efforts to make Liesel open-up herself to them, their family little by little became close enough to cafe for each other truly. His character is unique in a way that he is the one that acts as a bridge that connects and a wall that supports their family.

The actors portrayed the characters well since the emotions of the actors are really portrayed well which makes understanding the emotions of the characters on different scenes help me understand what they really feel at each moment.

Unfortunately I did not read the book so I don’t know if the film is faithful to the novel’s plot.