Winner of the Best Picture at the 1998 European Film Awards and the Grand Jury Prize at the 1998 Cannes Film Festival.
'A masterpiece. Romantic, hilarious, and astonishingly moving.' Chicago Tribune
1939: Guido, an Italian Jew, comes to a Tuscan town in search of his fortune. He meets and is smitten by schoolteacher Dora, a gentile; but she is already engaged, to a local Fascisto. Nevertheless, Dora is wooed and won by Guido's clownish charm. But the shadow of bigotry threatens to fall across their happiness.
1945: Guido and Dora are married, with a son, Giosue. For all Guido's sunny disposition, he cannot ignore the fact that anti-Semitism has become iron law, and he and Giosue are sent to a concentration camp. Begging to be sent with them, Dora is instead confined in an adjoining all-female camp. In the darkest of hours, Guido desperately falls back upon his comedic gift, to try to shield his son from the abysmal fate confronting them. His clowning may be their only hope of survival . . .
- ISBN10 0571200346
- ISBN13 9780571200344
- Publish Date 15 February 1999
- Publish Status Active
- Out of Print 11 March 2021
- Publish Country GB
- Imprint Faber & Faber
- Edition Main
- Format Paperback (B-Format (198x129 mm))
- Pages 176
- Language English