Life Is Beautiful (Italian: La vita รจ bella) is a 1997 Italian tragicomedy drama film directed by and starring Roberto Benigni. Benigni plays Guido Orefice, a Jewish Italian book keeper, who must employ his fertile imagination to shield his son from the horrors of internment in a Nazi concentration camp. Part of the film came from Benigni's own family history; before his birth Roberto's father had survived three years of internment at the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp. The film was a critical and financial success, winning Benigni the Academy Award for Best Actor at the 71st Academy Awards as well as the Academy Award for Best Original Dramatic Score and the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film.