The Reader

Drew Dahle's Thoughts:
I confess I wasn’t expecting too much from The Reader. I was mainly going in to see Kate Winslet, and I’m always up for watching something Roger Deakins shoots. While not as good as his first effort Billy Elliott, Stephen Daldry’s second film about adolescence was a pretty interesting watch. I usually am a bit wary of “Holocaust films” because they tend to be one-note—that one note being “this was a terrible thing, now be sad”—but The Reader features a pretty complex screenplay by David Hare from Bernard Schlink’s novel. Winslet, as Hannah Schmitz, is quite good as an illiterate, ignorant tram officer—and former concentration camp guard—who cannot understand the criminal wrongdoing of her past. She is met by the protagonist 15 year old Michael and they begin an illicit affair consisting of sex and storytime. Michael (David Kross, who acts circles around Ralph Fiennes who plays older Michael) then, having ended the affair, rediscovers Hannah when he attends her trial for role in concentration camps. This was a kind of a strange picture, because not a lot happens plotwise, but the film is still engaging throughout, anchored by an excellent score by Nico Muhly, and Kross and Winslet have chemistry, really selling the young man/older woman love affair. What is most interesting about the film is seeing the psyches of Hannah and Michael, particularly how Michael’s grows and changes and how Hannah’s never does. Overall, though lacking a bit of aesthetic flair, it’s a pretty consistently engaging and human story; and it earns bonus points for exhibiting all the joy and wonder cassette tapes can bring.