The Reader (2008)

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

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)

Trailer

More like this

• A Good Boy (2008)
• The Boy in the Striped Pajamas (2008)
• Die Perlmutterfarbe (2008)
• Where Hands Touch (2018)
• Der große Tom (2008)
• Ihr könnt euch niemals sicher sein (2008)
• Kommissarin Lucas – Der schwarze Mann (2008)
• The Architect (2008)