The Reader
Movie Review
"The Reader"
Review by Eric D. Snider
Grade: C-
Rating: R
Released: Wednesday, December 10, 2008
Directed by:
Cast:
Stephen Daldry has directed two very different feature films, "Billy Elliot" and "The Hours," and earned Oscar nominations for both of them. One was joyful, one was somber, but both were full of humanity: You believed in the characters, and you related to them.
How, then, has Daldry managed to make something as soulless and hollow as "The Reader"? Based on a very popular German novel by Bernhard Schlink and adapted by "The Hours" scribe David Hare, whatever legitimacy it once had must have been lost in translation, because what appears on the screen is a cold, artless lump about the Holocaust, the Nazis, and the scourge of illiteracy. (Yes, really.)
What it has going for it is a characteristically sharp performance by Kate Winslet, naked most of the time as she plays Hanna Schmitz, a secretive German woman who initiates an affair with a 15-year-old boy in Neustadt in 1958. The boy, Michael (David Kross, also naked a lot of the time), can barely believe his good fortune at having scored with a beautiful older woman, and he pursues the relationship (which is little more than a friends-with-benefits situation) with enthusiasm, rushing to her apartment every day after school to the exclusion of his friends and family. He doesn't notice that Hanna doesn't seem to have any other friends or connections, nor does he mind that she always wants him to read to her before they get down to business.
The actor, David Kross (who was of legal age when the naughty parts were filmed) has a youthful, innocent smile that we know is bound for frownsville when the May-December romance comes to its inevitable conclusion. Jump ahead to 1966, when he's a law student observing a trial of war criminals, one of whom is none other than Hanna Schmitz. Michael is stricken. You can practically see the pulp novel hitting the shelves: "I Was Deflowered by a Nazi War Criminal!"
Framing all of this are scenes set in 1995 with a middle-aged Michael, now played by Ralph Fiennes, reflecting on his youth and dealing with some of its aftermath. These scenes, like about 90% of such scenes in movies like this, are unnecessary, and they are further diminished by a fact that we have been loath to admit thus far: Ralph Fiennes is one of the dullest actors ever built. He needs to be given interesting things TO DO. By himself, sitting around having flashbacks, he is a black hole of ennui.
But back to 1966. With the titillation of the film's first half now a distant memory, Michael is grappling with his still-tender feelings for this woman and what the new facts that have come to light really say about her -- and, by extension, what they say about Germany of the 1930s and '40s. There are ethical and legal dilemmas to consider; as Michael's law professor says, "The question is never was it wrong, but was it legal?"
Was Hanna a bad person? Was she simply "following orders"? Did she exercise compassion with the prisoners she oversaw? For Michael, it's a civics lesson, an episode of Schoolhouse Reich. For us, it's a squandered opportunity to examine these thought-provoking themes, wasted on characters that the movie -- despite Winslet and Kross' best efforts -- won't let us get close to.
Grade: C-
Rated R, abundant nudity and a lot of sexuality
2 hrs., 3 min.
Copyright © Eric D. Snider.
This work may not be transmitted via the Internet, nor reproduced in any other way, without written consent from Eric D. Snider.
This item has 9 comments
December 22, 2008 at 6:40 am
I am so using "bound for frownsville". I may even retrofit my high school band name to that. Hope that's okay. Thanks, Eric!
P.S. I may also steal the term "Schoolhouse Reich". Just so you know.
December 25, 2008 at 6:48 am
Don't worry, the book was just as soulless and lame as the movie. When I finished the book I thought, "Why did they make a movie of this crap and why is Kate Winslet wasting her talents?" and then I remembered her role on Extras where she said she HAS to get an Oscar and will stoop to unbelievably low roles to get one. So funny!
January 2, 2009 at 4:42 am
Naked nazi war criminals?!?!
January 2, 2009 at 1:47 pm
"Schoolhouse Reich" just made cola come out my nose. Awesome.
January 2, 2009 at 3:22 pm
Why didn't they just "age" the young man as they did Kate; Fiennes
looked nothing like the young Michael. Fiennes, as the lawyer
KNEW that she was illiterate and could not have written the report. Pointless film. Wasted my time.
February 7, 2009 at 10:47 am
I must know: Did Kate Winslet shave her arm pits for her role in the movie?
March 11, 2009 at 5:26 pm
I think I wanna give Eric's review a C-. I mean you honestly think a snoozefest like "The Hours' is better than this movie? Ok whatever. I don't think it's a perfect movie and I personally wouldn't have given it a Best Picture nomination, but it's not as bad as Eric is making it out to be. It's odd that with all the movies Eric has seen, he makes a big deal of the nudity and sexuality in the film. Yes, Winslet is naked a lot but it's only for the first half hour of the film and the sex scenes are usually brief and not all that graphic in my opinion.
As for the movie itself. I found it to be an honest examination of Germany's post-WWII generation and how these young Germans grew up having to come to terms with the fact these horrific crimes were committed or ignored by their parents, grandparents, teachers and in this case, lovers. This is an area I don't I've seen dealt with in a "holocaust movie." I guess you could say Anna and Michael represent Germany's past and future and the innocence lost upon finding out that thing you love has a dark past that may too big to overcome. There's also the theme of history repeating itself when both Anna and Michael have a chance to improve Anna's legal situation but both choose to do nothing for reasons of fear and pride much like the Germans who knew darn well what was happening to the Jews during WWII and just looked the other way. The part of Michael reading on tapes to Anna and she learning to read is symbolic of his generation dealing with that history. The victims and perpetrators of the holocaust are dead but it is by reading that future generations never forget the lessons of the past. The ending scenes with Michael and the Jewish lady and his daughter wrapped up that theme niceley, I thought.
It's not a movie for everybody, but I think it's unfortunate if people here skipped the movie because of Eric's review.
April 18, 2009 at 4:14 pm
I don't think that mentioning briefly (in parentheses, no less) that the two main characters are naked for a good part of the movie is really making a big deal. If he had said "THIS MOVIE IS TERRIBLE, NUDITY AND IMMORALITY ABOUNDS! FORGET THE HOLOCAUST, PEOPLE, IT'S THE SEX WE SHOULD BE WORRIED ABOUT!!" then yeah, it could be argued that he made a big deal about it.
August 29, 2009 at 8:18 am
The book a n d the film are interesting dealing with the problem of the holocaust from quite another point of view than (for instance) Schindler's List or Sunshine. It speaks from the mental state of Germany after the holocaust facing with the committed crimes. That's why Schlink's book and Daldry's film deserve special interest. These can maybe boring for those who were not interested in it and live(d) far from the events. I honour the morality of the film. Hannah Schmitz is illiterate but this fact doesn't exonerate her responsibility. Touched by the first love in controversy with his sense of justice, it's just the performance of Ralph Fiennes which expresses the mental nuances of this hard situation with very fine and subtle tools. (I liked David Cross' work too, he is very talented and really doesn't resemble to Ralph Fiennes. ) Action doesn't mean doing brutalities or even romantic deeds but since the discovery of premier plan mental events can be dramatic factors by a look, by a sigh etc. and I think that it's not dull.