14 DAY TRIAL // Controversy is always a good thing for a film because it gets people to talk about it, and thus acknowledge it. However, some say, there is controversy, and then there’s controversy, with one of them not being the good kind, the type that can sink a project altogether. “The Reader,” Kate Winslet’s latest movie, is now at the midst of an organized campaign meant to rob her of what is considered her rightfully earned statuette.
Ron Rosenbaum, renowned author of “Explaining Hitler,” says that giving an Oscar to “The Reader” is like condoning war crimes and taking the side of a murderer who sheepishly stood by while 300 women were burned alive in a locked church. In a piece simply called “Don’t Give an Oscar to The Reader,” Rosenbaum presents his arguments why the film should not be acknowledged at this year’s edition of the awards ceremony. At the same time, he’s also sending it to members of the panel, in a bid to not have Kate Winslet as the winner, but Meryl Streep.
Rosenbaum labels the film as the clearest instance of “Holocaust denial” or “revisionism,” meant to exculpate the German people for standing aside while such horrible crimes were taking place everywhere around them. Illiteracy does not and cannot explain their passiveness, he argues, because you’d have to be stupid, blind and deaf not to see what was going on around you, not only illiterate. Therefore, the film’s attempt to identify Winslet’s character with the Germans fails from the very start, he maintains.
“[…] Which is what Hanna did, although, of course, it’s not shown in the film. As I learned from the director at a screening of The Reader, the scene was omitted because it might have ‘unbalanced’ our view of Hanna, given too much weight to the mass murder she committed, as opposed to her lack of reading skills. Made it more difficult to develop empathy for her, although it’s never explained why it’s important that we should.” Rosenbaum underlines, trying to point out that Winslet’s character is, no matter what, a murderer and it’s wrong to even try to have the audience feel empathy for her.
“That’s the metaphoric thrust of the Kate Winslet character’s ‘illiteracy’: She’s a stand-in for the German people and their supposed inability to ‘read’ the signs that mass murder was being done in their name, by their fellow citizens. To which one can only say: What a crock! Or if Hollywood has its way: Here’s your Oscar.” Rosenbaum further adds. The organized backlash, still, will go on as planned, several media outlets are reporting: this piece is being sent to members of the panel and, hopefully, “The Reader” will not get an Oscar at this year’s ceremony.