Some stories are true that never happened - Ted Boynton
Bernhard Schlink’s novel The Reader, an engaging
meditation on the puzzling duality of human nature, makes a solid
jump to the big screen in director Stephen Daldry’s film of the
same name.
Never shrinking from its characters’ failings, The Reader offers
an unflinching view into grey areas of morality: Is it ever
acceptable to forgive a horrific crime committed by a lover? Does
ethical behavior require that one intervene to help a person who
consciously refuses to help herself? Why is the seduction of a
15-year-old boy by a 36-year-old woman unremarkable in this
context?
This last question didn’t truly strike me until the movie was
over, when it occurred to me that, throughout the film, Daldry
makes no apology or excuse for Hanna’s sexual relationship with a
teenager.
Whether because it’s a boy with a woman, or because it was
Europe in the 1950s, Daldry simply presents the event as something
that occurred, leading to other events of greater import.
Even more impressive is the film’s refusal to soften or explain
away Hanna’s culpability for her role in the Nazi machine.
In an era when unsympathetic protagonists are either spruced up
by nervous studio executives or neutered by focus groups, Daldry
and Hare admirably elect not to interfere with the tone and pitch
of Schlink’s characterization.
