Hitler as an imaginary friend? ‘Jojo Rabbit’ and the state of satire.
Is political satire possible today? I don’t mean late-night talk show japes and “Saturday Night Live” burlesques but the real, subversive deal: ridicule with a reformist’s zeal.
These thoughts came to mind while attending the world premiere of Taika Waititi’s overscaled, underachieving “Jojo Rabbit” at the Toronto International Film Festival. It’s about a fatherless 10-year-old boy (Roman Griffin Davis) in 1945 Germany whose imaginary friend is Adolf Hitler, played by Waititi as a goofball oaf. In the course of the film the boy bonds with the Jewish girl (Thomasin McKenzie)
