Holocaust Unit: Key Question and 'Life is Beautiful'

How are victims, villains and heroes of tragedy and trauma valued and given a voice?

We need to apply this key question to Life is Beautiful:

1. What is a tragedy? A tragedy is a tragic story that leaves the person with extreme emotions and is a conflict with an overpowering source
2. How is Life is Beautiful a tragedy? This story is a tragedy because the people being affected are being treated terribly and the story depicts that they are just like us. Many bad and good things happen throughout the story that leaves the viewer with extreme emotion.
3. Could it also be a comedy? I do think that in some ways it is a comedy. I believe so because it makes you laugh in the way that the protagonist makes the horrible situation into a fun game for his little child and he makes everything into a joke. Despite the situation Guido tries to make it humorous using slap stick humor.
4. What is a villain? What is a hero? What is a victim? Give examples of each both from real life and from fiction. A villain is someone that makes the story hard for the hero, they are either bad or evil in the way that they act throughout the story with intention and repeatedly. A hero is someone that is either treated harshly and acts in a good matter, and they may also save the day for the others or themselves, they also go against the villain. A victim is someone that is being treated extremely harshly and affected by the villain. Victims are usually wrongly accused and are treated badly without necessarily doing anything wrong. Example of villains: terrorists, Stalin, Osama Bin Laden. Examples of a hero: Bill Gates, Martin Luther King, Paramedics. Examples of victims: Rwandans, Natural Disaster victims, Milly Dowler.
5. Who are the villains, victims and heroes? The villains in the movie are the Germans, the victims are the Jews and the heroes are the Americans. The main victim is Joshua because he is very unaware of what is going on. The second most victim is Dora, she is a victim of class because her husband is very wealthy and she is not as wealthy and she is also a victim of the holocaust. The Doctor however is a victim and a villain because he is a Nazi but he does not want to do what he is doing. The hero is Guido who is fighting for Joshua the victim who cannot fight for himself. Dora was also a hero because he sacrificed herself to be with her family. 
6. What value do each of these characters play in the movie? What role do they play in the plot? What role do they play in connecting the movie to history? What role do they play in evoking a reaction from the audience? (List the important characters in the movie and label them as either villains or heroes. Then, in dot points, list the important role they play in regards to plot, history, and to the audience.) The Nazi's are the antagonists in the second half but in the first half the antagonist is Dora's fiance. Guido is the protagonist he drives the story and is the hero. The Jews (victims) drive the story add to the story and the complication to the story and Joshua ads to the emotional side of the story as he is purely innocent. The Jews add a depth of emotion to the story as the antagonists the German are very horrible to the victims. Whereas the heros/ the Americans add relief when they come and drive the Germans out saving the Jews. All of the story is very closely factual to the Second World War and this all is history as it is the Jews in the German concentration camp. The Germans makes the crowd feel hatred as they are very sorry for what the Jews are having to go through this adds to the plot. The Nazi's are very cold and emotionless almost robot like which makes the story feel cold and you feel almost no happy emotions for the Nazi's which is intended. Guido is fairly humorous about the whole thing which makes the situations easier to watch and lightens the move and gives the audience a sense of familiarity. It makes you admire the hero because he is going out of his way and trying very hard to try and makes his sons time in the Concentration camp easier and fun. Joshua however makes you feel empathy by portraying extreme innocence. Everything people have to give are being ripped away from the by the Nazi's which makes the audience feel extremely sad. Love, money, power, family, happiness, all of these things are taken away from the Jews in a blink of an eye which shows that they are helpless to stop the Nazi's onslaught.