There is a line in The Reader: "Societies think they operate by morality but they don't. They operate by law." It is a statement that sets the stage for most of what happens on scales large and small during one of 2008's most thought-provoking pictures of any year -- a movie about sex, ethics, morality, law, right and wrong, judgment, punishment, revenge. Scape-goating.
The marketing says the movie will force you to question everything you believe. There's a little hyperbole in that statement, but not much. It that way The Reader reminds me of Doubt. I left the movie full of questions of what I believe about the topics the movie covers, and that's just fine with me.
The movie jumps around in time a little bit, but the foundation of the story takes place during the summer of 1958. There is a torrid affair between a teen and an older woman who meet by chance. If my math is right, Hannah (Kate Winslet) is 36 and her love interest Michael (new-comer David Kross) is 15. There is mystery to Hannah. She has a lot of secrets. There is an unspoken innocence about Michael, but he has secrets of his own.
At one point, Hannah endures intense courtroom questioning for something she'd done years before. Her primary interrogator, a distinguished-looking judge who appears to be in search of Truth®, asks why she did this and this and this. Her answer astounds. Her question is sincere. She really wants to know.
The courtroom (and the movie audience) goes dead silent. All ponder the question while it hangs in the air like a thick fog and we sit as Hannah's judge. The Truth Seeker® who sits in judgment lowers his head. Not a single word crosses his lips.
The judge is not the only culpable person in the room, and I'm not talking about Hannah, the woman who's on trial. In fact, very few in the movie come thru as innocent and one comes thru as equally guilty as Hannah of crimes against humanity; what Roger Ebert describes as "a fact of human nature: Most people, most of the time, all over the world, choose to go along. We vote with the tribe."
And if you think this is a movie about Nazis then you just weren't paying attention.
It's a great movie. I rate it a 9+ out of 10. Some movies you'll buy, some you won't. I'll buy The Reader. Another test of how good a movie is: would you be willing to pay to see it again on the big screen? On this one, I most definitely would.
****************Caveat****************
The marketing says the movie will force you to question everything you believe. There's a little hyperbole in that statement, but not much. It that way The Reader reminds me of Doubt. I left the movie full of questions of what I believe about the topics the movie covers, and that's just fine with me.
The movie jumps around in time a little bit, but the foundation of the story takes place during the summer of 1958. There is a torrid affair between a teen and an older woman who meet by chance. If my math is right, Hannah (Kate Winslet) is 36 and her love interest Michael (new-comer David Kross) is 15. There is mystery to Hannah. She has a lot of secrets. There is an unspoken innocence about Michael, but he has secrets of his own.
At one point, Hannah endures intense courtroom questioning for something she'd done years before. Her primary interrogator, a distinguished-looking judge who appears to be in search of Truth®, asks why she did this and this and this. Her answer astounds. Her question is sincere. She really wants to know.
The courtroom (and the movie audience) goes dead silent. All ponder the question while it hangs in the air like a thick fog and we sit as Hannah's judge. The Truth Seeker® who sits in judgment lowers his head. Not a single word crosses his lips.
The judge is not the only culpable person in the room, and I'm not talking about Hannah, the woman who's on trial. In fact, very few in the movie come thru as innocent and one comes thru as equally guilty as Hannah of crimes against humanity; what Roger Ebert describes as "a fact of human nature: Most people, most of the time, all over the world, choose to go along. We vote with the tribe."
And if you think this is a movie about Nazis then you just weren't paying attention.
It's a great movie. I rate it a 9+ out of 10. Some movies you'll buy, some you won't. I'll buy The Reader. Another test of how good a movie is: would you be willing to pay to see it again on the big screen? On this one, I most definitely would.
There's a lot of nudity for the first 30-40 minutes; frontal, backal, boy, and girl. I don't mind nekidness, don't get me wrong, but it may have been just a tad overdone. Maybe not. Just be ready for it.
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