He is ridiculed at training (an incident that gives him the nickname of the title) and his attempted comeback results in injury and permanent scarring. His supportive mother has a few things to say about that and he is reinstated at the training facility as a kind of intern, outspoken as a good, freshfaced Nazi. But there are complications and those I'll leave for your screening.
Taika Waititi plays a delicate game here. On the one hand he must steer short of empathising Nazi characters (he appears himself as the imaginary Hitler) and on the other must avoid too heavy a hand in allowing the deliverance from that mindset back into humaneness.
Cleverly, his Hitler can be both boisterously supportive of Jojo when in need but monstrously childish in moments of stress, but then bumblingly ineffectual when faced with difficult issues. He is, after all, the invention of a child seeking a hero and with a child's limitations he is a consistent source of comedy as well as emotional violence. It's a strong turn by Waititi let down only by his more cutomary deadpan moments. Then again, this is a delicate balance.
Most of the story is given to us through the vision of Jojo himself and, while it could easily have been a kind of slapstick version of The Tin Drum, the film pulls well back from a more adult horror (remembering that Oscar was an adult in a boy's body). But this is still Nazi Germany so while the Hitler Youth training (with a hilariously off-hand Sam Rockwell in charge) is mostly goofy there are public hangings. A lot of the middle made obvious by this is filled with Scarlett Johanson as Jojo's mother who brings a strained brightness and whimsy to her son's life with good humour laced with graver life lessons. While her superb performance in the otherwise plodding Marriage Story will eclipse this one her commitment to this character takes us with her.
Roman Griffin Davies is luminous in the title role, constantly puzzled by a world ruled by easy answers to difficult problems from one corner and complications from every other. He is, refreshingly, a kid, not a wisecracking adult in leder shorts. The dialogue is deliberately modern for a comic frisson with its setting but even then his delivery of it feels natural. That's important as, however closely this piece sparks against magical realism it would implode if it banged its way in there. The other major relationship that must work is with Elsa (a wickedly arch but deep performance from Thomasin McKenzie) and it is there where the magic meets the real gets a lot tougher to carve.
This will sound facetious but isn't: the main lesson of this film for cinema goers is in the trailer which not only reveals too much but also steers prospective audiences to expect something that it isn't. It is not, not, not the Third Reich in Wellington, nor Mel Brooks does The Tin Drum. Don't expect a big laugh every few minutes. Jojo Rabbit holds a lot of comedy but it is steadfastly a fable about ethics, the kind of ethics that can bring their bearers to face death for their sake. The final moments that show the reward for this are highly manipulative but also life affirming and beautiful. See if you don't have something in your eye when the song starts.
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