The Reader

Go see The Reader.



I thought it was brilliant. Beautiful and sexy certainly, and also a history of post-war Germany's silence, secrets, knowing and not speaking.



In some ways it was an old-fashioned court room drama with the key challenges focused in the trial. No excuses, no justification nor trivialisation of what was done in the war but still the question of ordinary people caught up in the machinery of evil: what would you have done?



In the background too, buildings and building work - a visual analogue of German reconstruction.

It was a love story of sorts, but mostly the silent sort.

Lots of detail on Wikipedia.