One we can remember and one we can try and do something about

Rating: 9/10 (8 February 2009)

The Reader Imagine yourself as a 15 year old school boy infatuated by a middle aged attractive woman. And then imagine that your infatuation then becomes reality and you have an affair with this very woman. As the story unfolds and the woman moves away your next discovery becomes startling. You discover that the woman you fell in love with, is part of the biggest atrocity of the Second World War. The Reader is a very accomplished film, thought provoking and brilliantly acted.
For the first time in many years there are great actresses up for Oscars. Angeline Jolie for The Changeling, Meryl Streep for Doubt and Kate Winslett for her portrayal of Hannah Schmitt. Where Winslett edges the competition is how she manages to display an aloofness and naivety, that makes you feel a moral dilemma as the story unfolds. David Kross is superb as the young Michael as is Feinnes as the older Michael. But where the film is to be commended is where the lesser parts are equally delivered as powerful. A scene where the student questions his Law Teacher by saying "This trail is a diversion- There are 6 people on trial that are guilty and they are only there because of a book that was written" He goes on to add that the Nation was guilty there were thousands of camps, thousands of guards at Auschwitz and everyone knew about them, our parents, our teachers and they are all as guilty for not doing anything about them. He infers that the Nation are putting 6 people on trial as if to absolve themselves of the crime. The next great scene is the survivor who says to the older Michael  "Don't go to the camps you wont find the answers there, they are empty. We never went there for therapy they weren't Universities we were clear what it was we had to do". What she is inferring to, is that those that are punished for their crimes are treated humanely and have the opportunity to get something from their crimes, whereas it was clear they had nothing and were going to get nothing and all they could do was try to survive. There will be many who say  Not another film of the holocaust-(If you can get the Frontline 55 minute movie which was made directly at the time of the camps being liberated then you will have no doubts it happened). But it is a necessary film to make and where this film should deserve and get high praise is in the way it is told. Where this film is so brilliant is if you know nothing about the plot or what the film is about because then you find as I did you will be shocked. It would be fantastic if the film received best film Oscar which I doubt or indeed best Director because as a film that is up there with the best. The central point of the film is that Winslett is illiterate and so The Reader is the young Michael and later the older Michael and those that were in the death camp. If the film achieves two things highlighting that we must never forget the Holocaust and illiteracy is something that we can do something about. Then it will have achieved more than the actors, actresses and Director could hope for, whether they win Oscars or not.