Bruno Hero's Journey

Bruno completes the Hero’s Journey, and this feature renders the film an allegory rather than a piece of historical fiction. Understanding Bruno’s metamorphosis through these steps is essential to understanding the central point of the story. In the film, physical boundaries indicate when a new stage is reached. The stages of the Hero’s Journey are divided into three worlds: the ordinary word, the other world and the ordinary world as understood through the lens of a newfound knowledge. In the film, these stages correspond to the Berlin house, the countryside and the compound first to introduce the Hero’s Journey in an overarching sense. However, the settings this paper will analyze as they relate specifically to Bruno include: the compound,

Clearly, Bruno is enamored with his father’s role as a soldier and looks up to the military a glorious ideal. This idealization is evident when his mother announces that his father got a promotion and, worried, Bruno confirms that Ralf “is still a soldier.” This scene leads directly into the call to adventure, the first step on the Hero’s Journey. Ralf’s promotion means they are moving—that is, Bruno will be leaving the ordinary world to travel to the compound. True to Campbell’s formula, Bruno refuses this call to adventure, as the Berlin house is the metaphor for a comfortable, familiar ignorance. However, he is unable to resist his parents’

We see him attempting to retain a grasp on his fantasies by skipping across the pathway stones the way the Jewish children did in the propaganda film. Disconcerted by what he is witnessing, he begs Schmuel to take him to the café—but Schmuel only shakes his head and explains there is none. Finally, the boys wander into a warehouse full of sick men. Not a moment later they are swept out by officers and into the gas chambers. All through this, Bruno remains conspicuously unaware of what is