Right up to the day of Jojo Rabbit‘s theatrical release, Fox Searchlight keeps rolling out the clips and featurettes, this time giving a peek into the making of Taika Waititi‘s anti-hate satire. But the new Jojo Rabbit featurette, which gives a behind-the-scenes look at the production of the film alongside the requisite glowing words from the stars, actually does a good job of addressing some of the criticisms levied against the movie. Watch the Jojo Rabbit featurette below.

Jojo Rabbit Featurette

As Jojo Rabbit makes its theatrical debut this weekend following a successful festival circuit, 20th Century Fox ends its barrage of clips and promos with a behind-the-scenes making of featurette that kind of directly addresses the biggest criticisms lobbied at the film. While /Film’s Chris Evangelista loved Waititi’s World War II comedy out of TIFF, writing in his review that “Jojo Rabbit wants to ascribe to the belief that there’s always a chance for redemption and that the best way to stamp out evil is to allow kindness to prevail,” others have criticized the film for its hamfisted satire and giving a sympathetic portrayal to Nazis.

But in the featurette, Waititi is aware that he walks a thin line with this satire, and that he doesn’t want the comedy to overshadow the message of love and tolerance he wants to spread.

“I wanted to make sure that it didn’t just seem like I was making a weird comedy amongst a really traumatic, violent, and tumultuous time period in history,” Waititi says in the featurette. “It’s really easy to get caught up in this idea that you’re entertaining people with laughs and ridiculous moments. I just had to make sure that I wasn’t letting that get the better of the story and take over essentially what was the main message which is we need to be more tolerant, and spread more love and less hate.”

Jojo Rabbit stars Waititi, Scarlett Johansson, Sam Rockwell, Thomasin McKenzie, Rebel Wilson, and newcomer Roman Griffin Davis as JoJo.

Here is the synopsis for Jojo Rabbit:

Writer director Taika Waititi (THOR: RAGNAROK, HUNT FOR THE WILDERPEOPLE), brings his signature style of humor and pathos to his latest film, JOJO RABBIT, a World War II satire that follows a lonely German boy (Roman Griffin Davis as JoJo) whose world view is turned upside down when he discovers his single mother (Scarlett Johansson) is hiding a young Jewish girl (Thomasin McKenzie) in their attic. Aided only by his idiotic imaginary friend, Adolf Hitler (Taika Waititi), Jojo must confront his blind nationalism.

Jojo Rabbit opens in theaters on October 18, 2019.

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