Taika Waititi’s New Satire ‘Jojo Rabbit’ Gets a Bizarrely Funny Debut Trailer

Before he became Marvel's golden boy thanks to his revitalization of the Thor franchise, Taika Waititi was crafting bizarrely funny movies in his native New Zealand like Boy, What We Do in the Shadows, and Hunt for the Wilderpeople. His next film, Jojo Rabbit, returns Waititi to his roots before he returns to the MCU with Thor: Love and Thunder, and it looks like it's bound to be his most controversial film yet.

The World War II-era film centers around a young German boy named Jojo who is a member of the Hitler Youth Army and whose mother (Scarlett Johansson) is hiding a young Jewish girl in their home. Also, his imaginary friend is Hitler himself, played by Waititi. It doesn't necessarily sound like a comedy and there's sure to be plenty in this film that isn't funny, but Waititi is using satire to prove a point about hate and intolerance, a trick as old as satire itself.

The film features a solid supporting cast that includes my boo Sam Rockwell, as well as Stephen Merchant, Alfie Allen, and Rebel Wilson. True, the Nazi satire subgenre has had plenty of rotten entries like Uwe Boll's Blubberella and the Iron Sky movies, but this looks as though it might actually be funny, unlike those other movies.

Jojo Rabbit will make its world premiere at September's Toronto International Film Festival before beginning its theatrical rollout on October 18.