Life Is Beautiful

Miramax Films | Release Date: October 23, 1998

CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION

58	METASCORE Mixed or average reviews based on 32 Critic Reviews

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Critic Reviews

Critic score Publication By date

100

Film.comElizabeth Weitzman

Benigni, with great help from young Cantarini, has crafted a work of such complexity that you may find both your brain and your heart simply overloaded. Which, of course, is the rarely achieved goal of all art.

100

Michael Wilmington

A deeply moving blend of cold terror and rapturous hilarity. Lovingly crafted by Italy's top comedian and most popular filmmaker, it's that rare comedy that takes on a daring and ambitious subject and proves worthy of it. Read full review

100

Shawn Levy

One of the greatest films about the civilian experience of war ever made anywhere. Read full review

TNT RoughCutChristopher Brandon

Its unique message about laughing in the face of evil clearly reveals that life is beautiful.

Mike Clark

To see someone even attempt bittersweet treatment of this subject is surprising, but to largely pull it off is a major feat. Read full review

Jami Bernard

A rare blend of comedy and tenderness whose point is not the horrors of war but the lengths a parent will go to protect his child's innocence. Read full review

Roger Ebert

Finds the right notes to negotiate its delicate subject matter. Read full review

Janet Maslin

Benigni effectively creates a situation in which comedy is courage. And he draws from this an unpretentious, enormously likable film that plays with history both seriously and mischievously. Piety has no place here, nor do tears until the final reel. Life is Beautiful plays by its own rules Read full review

Joshua Klein

The concept is not so much nihilistic as it is realistic, and the fact that Benigni has made such fine distinctions so powerfully clear is amazing and moving. Read full review

Film.comSean Means

It's a high-wire act without a net, and Benigni pulls it off with astounding grace and sensitivity. Read full review

Michael O'Sullivan

In one bold stride, Benigni has set himself apart from the rank and file of funnymen, joining the elite class of clowns who know that humor and heartbreak are only a howl of pain apart. Read full review

Dallas ObserverM. V. Moorhead

If, like Benigni, you were born after World War II, it reassures us that he hasn't forgotten the innate seriousness of his subject matter, and that despite its grimness, he still thinks life is beautiful. Read full review

Rick Groen

Ultimately, Benigni's comic refinery merely transforms the banality of evil into a lesser sin -- the evil of banality. Read full review

Walter Addiego

Succeeds better than it ought to, largely because of the personality and prodigious talents of its director and star, the Italian comedian Roberto Benigni. Read full review

James Berardinelli

It's the depiction of the love and sacrifice of a father for a son that makes Life is Beautiful worthwhile. Read full review

Film.comPeter Brunette

While most reviewers will accuse it of sentimentality (a charge that is justified), audiences, who don't feel the need to appear rigorous and tough-minded all the time, will flock to it in droves.

David Rooney

Sluggish, uneven and lacking in rhythm, it nonetheless has enough pathos and winning humor. Read full review

Film.comJohn Hartl

The story moves beyond the limitations of its setting, transforming itself into an affecting parable about the lengths to which parents will go to protect their children from trauma, cruelty and knowledge of evil.

Rita Kempley

While it celebrates the triumph of humor, invention and the human spirit, Life Is Beautiful is not the transporting experience it might have been. Benigni knows how to make us laugh, but he has not yet figured out how to make us cry. Read full review