Jojo Rabbit, the exuberant new period film by Thor: Ragnarok director Taika Waititi, is being billed, somewhat anxiously, perhaps, as “an anti-hate satire.” You can see how a marketing department might go the extra mile to spell this out, given that the movie’s central character is an avid member of the Hitler Youth. But for Jojo (Roman Griffin Davis), it’s just a big, fun club—like Boy Scouts with hand grenades. Then again, he’s a guileless 10-year-old boy who’s lived his entire life in a bubble of propaganda, indoctrination, and persuasive graphic design. Jojo is lonely. His father is gone, his sister is dead, and his mother, Rosie (Scarlett Johansson), doesn’t want to discuss Nazi nonsense. So for this, he turns to his imaginary friend, Adolf Hitler. Hitler—or, rather, the friendly Führer of Jojo’s imagination—is played by Waititi (who is half-Jewish) as a kind of idiot Hobbes to Jojo’s credulous Calvin. Not long after his first camp weekend, run by the hilariously louche, one-eyed Captain Klenzendorf (Sam Rockwell), goes disastrously wrong, Jojo comes home to discover that his mother is hiding a Jewish girl. Elsa (Thomasin McKenzie) is older, tougher, and beautiful, and Jojo is as terrified of her as he is fascinated. Darkly hilarious and unbearably sad, Jojo Rabbit is like a Wes Anderson movie set on Jupiter, whimsy tempered with gravity, and it’s precisely this juxtaposition that makes its message of empathy pop. —Carina Chocano
Frankie
Directed by Ira Sachs (Keep the Lights On, Little Men), Frankie is about a family coming together to come apart. Isabelle Huppert plays Frankie, a terminally ill movie star who plans one last vacation in the resort town of Sintra, Portugal, in order to sort everyone out. The story is as gossamer as it can be without evanescing completely—even Frankie’s illness is treated like a rumor. The family members have gathered but spend much of their time alone, strolling through forests, talking to strangers. Frankie tries to set up her son Paul (Jérémie Renier) with her hairstylist friend Irene (Marisa Tomei)—who has invited along her boyfriend Gary (Greg Kinnear). Frankie’s husband, Jimmy (Brendan Gleeson), is mourning her already, and her stepdaughter (Vinette Robinson) is trapped in a marriage that reveals itself to be a prison. The movie echoes its rhythms: meandering walks to nowhere, chance encounters with alluring strangers, ancient memories burnished through their telling until they gleam. Not much happens in Frankie, except life goes on—which, on the other hand, is everything. —Carina Chocano
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