The Reader is a 2009 film directed by Stephen Daldry, we are talking about an adaptation of the homonymous work by Bernhard Schlink, which together with the great Kate Winslet, along with Ralph Fiennes and David Kross, offers a reflection on some of the themes of our recent history.
We know that the Holocaust inspired a multitude of films and novels and that today it continues to give much to say, however, The Reader does not transport us to the Holocaust itself, but many years later, when some of the protagonists were tried and In addition, the story told in the film goes beyond drama and World War II, focuses on the characters , the history they lived and, above all, the past of one of them.
- The film brings a story that has passed.
- As a dream memory by its protagonist.
- Michael Berg.
- A man who.
- In his youth.
- Met a particular woman.
- Hanna.
- With whom he entered into a romantic relationship.
The reader begins with an adult, Michael, remembering this woman and her encounters during her youth; a woman whose name she didn’t even know when the relationship began. Dark, slow and mysterious, like Hanna hem, the film takes a fundamental argumentative twist that takes us to a very different story than the first.
From this tour we talk about, I feel compelled to say a spoiler throughout the article, so it is not recommended that you continue reading if you have not yet seen the film. The reader does not add a linear plot, but a round trip of jumps into the past and return to the present: Michael does not seem to accept his past, but cannot let him go, just as he did with Hanna.
Thus, the film inspires a reflection: we all have a past, we have a story behind that few people know, our life is a sea of secrets, experiences, sensations and people who have left traces. As much as we try to forget, untie ourselves, it is impossible, because the past is part of who we are today.
The Reader offers a journey through the story of Michael and Hanna, a discovery of the deepest secrets of these characters.
Hanna and Michael met by chance in the 1950s, when he was a teenager and she was a woman who doubled her age. Without even knowing their names, they began a strange relationship, based on sexual encounters and conversations of need. Michael was a teenager who still discovered his body and had never been with any woman, Hanna was the one who dictated the rules of his sexual intercourse.
Hanna continued to dictate the rules of the meetings and added one condition: Michael should read to him. He was a student interested in literature, so he always had books from his classes or from the library. Hanna listened intently to these stories Michael read, but never touched a book.
Complicity flowed between them, but they had just met. They never spoke of their past or their present; they maintained a totally clandestine relationship: an important step in which they shared books and sheets.
Hanna is described as a very secretive woman with a strong personality. The relationship seems very strange, even beyond the age difference between them. It’s like we can understand Michael, but not Hanna, who we know practically nothing about.
The film begins with a teenager’s sexual awakening, conveys the first desire for youth, the discovery of the body, the first contact with love, however, ends up unmasking the two main protagonists and questioning some questions about their past.
It will be many years before Michael and Hanna’s life is rediscovered, and then Michael will no longer be that naive teenager who asked no questions, but a young law student.
From that moment on, the film goes on to a much more serious story, where the whole truth will come out. Have there been trials to convict some of the women who worked as “guards”?during the Holocaust, Michael joins his fellow students and professors at the University and Hanna ends up being one of the students.
Unlike the rest of the defendants, Hanna doesn’t seem to be trying to defend he himself, he doesn’t seem to understand the seriousness of the problem he faces, a multitude of questions will go through Michael’s mind, do you really know the woman sitting down?How is it possible that she shows no signs of repentance?
More importantly, Michael finally discovers Hannah’s great secret: she is illiterate and her shame is so great that she doesn’t even try to tell the truth to escape from prison. Hannah has built an image of herself, an armor that introduces her. the world, but that hides its secret underneath.
The other defendants will do everything they can to prevent them from going to jail, trying to blame someone else, and when they involve Hanna in the development of a manuscript, all fingers will point her out as the main culprit. What no one knows is that Hannah couldn’t have written this manuscript because she’s illiterate, but under the pressure of doing a writing test, she decides to admit she’s the author.
How is it possible that Hannah is so deeply ashamed to be illiterate, but not of her past as a guardian during the Holocaust?Hanna does not deny her involvement in Nazism, but is unable to recognize her illiteracy even to get out of jail. .
At the same time, Michael will go to great effort to understand Hanna and find out who she is, a multitude of emotions spill from the screen thanks to the depth of her scenes, we all identify with Hanna’s sense of her greatest fear and sadness. faced with Michael’s discovery that, while he was reading to him as a teenager, Hanna used young Jewish women to read to him.
At present, we do not hesitate to try to condemn all those who have participated in such crimes, but it seems that we have forgotten the other side of the coin, a much more attractive face for some sections of the population.
Hanna was illiterate, living alone and could certainly never reach certain positions; Nazism was a promise of prosperity, work and for Hanna, being able to work as a guard was also a promise of status, but not only the illiterate were seduced by the ideas of Nazism, but also some thinkers like Heidegger (who later introduced himself to the subject), or poets like Ezra Pound, whose deep admiration for Mussolini made him collaborate in his propaganda and his transfer to Italy.
The exercise you propose reminds us deeply of the philosopher Hannah Arendt, who said that many Nazis were normal people, victims of their time and situation. In the film, Hanna argues that it was her job and therefore her obligation.
He claims that he merely obeyed orders and did his duty, without thinking too much of his actions. The reader presents a complex theme, difficult to address, offers a reflection of the past of these characters, how it affects the present and who. We are today. However, it also offers a reflection on the nature of one of humanity’s cruellest crimes.
“Societies want to be governed by something called morality, but they are actually governed by what is called the law. “