Review of The Book Thief (2013) by Aquaris475 — 30 Nov 2013

The Book Thief is one of the best books I've read, and thankfully, the same can be said for the film adaptation. The Book Thief mainly succeeds thanks to its acting. Each actor nails it as their characters perfectly, and delivers the perfect amount of emotion and dialogue.

It's some of the best acting I've ever seen in a film. the writing does a great job of sticking to the book. While there are obviously differences, and things outright taken out, the majority of the writing keeps true to the book.

Even though I don't deduct points for accuracy, I was impressed with how well it did towards the original novel. Even without the book accuracy, the writing and script were excellent. When it comes down to it, my only problems with the film is the safe approach and inconsistency.

The film does decent with its Nazi Germany setting, but plays with it way too safely. It seems like they tried not too mess with such a setting, and because of it, it feels like the Nazi setting is approached a bit too brightly, except for a select few scenes.

But the biggest problem is the inconsistency. Death narrates the movie, just like he does the book, but the problem here is that he's used a few times, and at random. It makes me wonder what the point of bringing Death into the film was, because his random use feels seriously off.

Aside from this problem, The Book Thief does excellent thanks to its strong acting and great direction, and I'd definitely recommend you see it.