Jakob the Liar (Peter Kassovitz, 1999)

Robin Williams in holocaust schmaltz shock! The suspicion can't be avoided that while Life Is Beautiful two years earlier got plenty of exposure in the U.S. market too, not least through Robert Benigni's Best Actor Oscar, the studio execs must have though there was still enough mileage in the comically-tinged Jews outsmarting Nazis weepy formula. To give it its due, Jakob the Liar is not an offensive film, just highly predictable with Williams in the Warsaw ghetto becoming an unwilling ray of hope through everyone's collective belief that he has a radio and through it has found out that the end of the war is nigh. Naturally, he takes a plucky young girl under his wing in the process. While Williams does his big-hearted turn as dependably as ever, and the rest of the cast contribute solid support too, it's too uncertainly toned to engage the emotions as deeply as the context requires.

5/10