Berlin, 1940s. Eight year-old Bruno returns from
playing with his school friends to find his home bustling with preparations:
his father, a Nazi officer, has just been promoted and his mother is
planning a party. Bruno sees no cause for celebration; his father's
new job is outside Berlin and the whole family will be moving to the
countryside, forcing him to leave the home and friends he loves. His
fears of loneliness are confirmed when the family arrives at their dreary,
isolated new house.
Bruno finds it difficult to settle into his new life and
quickly grows bored. There are no other children to play with and his
mother forbids him from exploring behind the house. His older sister
Gretel never bothers to talk to him anymore: she is too busy organising her
dolls, or talking to one of her father's men, the handsome, menacing young
Lieutenanct Kotler. Bruno is intrigued by the existence of an odd sort
of farm he can see from his bedroom window, where all the residents seem to
be wearing striped pyjamas. When he tries to find out more about the
'farm,' he is told not to concern himself with it and certainly not to go
near it. We know what Bruno does not, that the 'farm' is an
extermination camp. His mothers is also in ignorance - she believes
that they are living next to an internment or labour camp; her husband has
sworn under oath never to reveal its real purpose as a killing factory
designed to implement the 'Final Solution', the systematic eradication of
the Jewish people.
