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By Michaela Gordoni
Teddy Bear Award® winner director Sean McNamara sat down with Movieguide® to dive into his latest movie’s heart and humor.
BEAU: AN ARTIST AT WAR tells the true story of Joseph Bau, a Jewish artist who used his skills to save thousands of Holocaust victims.
“Once we got down to actually making the film, I went, ‘I don’t want to have another film which is just super sad.’ Because if it’s sad, nobody wants to see it,” McNamara told Movieguide®.
He wanted the movie to still contain notes of inspiration and joy, despite the heavy subject.
“So, I studied what Steven Spielberg did with SCHINDLER’S LIST, and I just did my research. The truth of the matter is Joseph Bau was funny…So, I was just trying to be true to the man, and when he would crack jokes or be funny and say inappropriate things, I said we had to capture that,” the director said.
He had to be careful, though. He didn’t want people saying, “It’s a funny Holocaust movie.”
“We had to put it in front of audiences. Do some of the jokes go too far? Should we pull back? And we did,” he said. “We kind of found that right mixture.”
One thing he wanted to accomplish was show the reason why Holocaust survivors lived — because they could find the miracles in things.
“Because they could laugh. Because they could find joy. The ones that said, ‘I’m just going to die here,’ they went quickly,” he said.
“But the ones who really were resilient knew how to wake up every day and find something to live for, and they had each other. And that’s pretty cool,” he explained.
Movieguide® gave the movie a -2 rating and presented McNamara with the 2026 Movieguide® Faith & Freedom Award® for BAU: ARTIST AT WAR.
Part of Movieguide®’s review reads, “BAU: ARTIST AT WAR is a moving depiction of the incredible true story of Joseph and Rebecca Bau. It is both humorous and heartbreaking. Lead actors Emile Hirsch and Inbar Lavi, deliver incredible, heartfelt performances as the two leads. What makes the movie so extraordinary is a script that includes the pain and suffering but punctuates it with real humor and heartfelt romance.”
The movie, which came out in theaters on Sept. 26, 2025, is available to purchase on Prime Video, Fandango, Apple TV, YouTube, Google Play Store and other digital service providers.
Read Next: Bau Artist At War, Where Light, Love and Hope Triumph
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