Underplayed Gems

The Reader (2008)

The Reader poster
Directed by
Stephen Daldry
Genre
drama film, prison film, romance film, coming-of-age film
Country
Germany, United States
Runtime
2h 04m
Rated
R
Rating
7.5 of 10 from 3,415 voters
Elsewhere
IMDb
The 3D catalogue: film cases on wooden shelves, with the cat sitting at the counter next to its greeting.

The catalogue in 3D

The film shelves have a room of their own that you can walk around in. The cat behind the counter is the AI Catbot, and they pick real films from the same catalogue when you tell them what you feel like watching. Nothing is for sale, here or in there. Go in from here and this film is already out on the counter, with more like it waiting on the shelf next to it.

More films like thisWatch the trailer

or watch the trailer on YouTube

How it feels

A 15-year-old boy has an affair with an older woman in 1950s Germany. Years later, he sees her again when she is on trial for her role as a guard at a Nazi concentration camp. He uncovers a secret she is hiding that she considers worse than her war crimes.

melancholicsomberslow-burnreflectivetenseemotionally heavycerebraluneasy

What happens

The Reader is a 2008 romantic drama film directed by Stephen Daldry, scripted by David Hare, adapting the 1995 German novel Der Vorleser by Bernhard Schlink, and starring Kate Winslet, Ralph Fiennes, David Kross, Bruno Ganz, and Karoline Herfurth. The film tells the story of Michael Berg, a Berlin lawyer who, as a 15-year-old in 1958, has a brief summer love affair with an older woman, Hanna Schmitz. She abruptly leaves, only to resurface years later as one of the defendants in a war crimes trial stemming from her actions as a guard at a Nazi concentration camp. Michael realizes that Hanna is keeping a personal secret she believes is worse than her Nazi past — a secret which, if revealed, could help her at the trial. The Reader was the last film for producers Anthony Minghella and Sydney Pollack, both of whom died prior to its release. Production began in September 2007, and the film opened in limited release on 10 December, 2008. It received average to favourable reviews from critics, with praise for Winslet and Kross's performances, but with some faults in its screenplay and direction. For her performance, Winslet won the Academy Award and BAFTA Award for Best Actress, as well as the Golden Globe and SAG Award for Best Supporting Actress. (from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA)

More like this

This page is from Underplayed Gems. Not quite it? You can browse by genre, country and year, or take this one into the 3D catalogue and ask the Catbot for something closer.