'The Reader' unconvincing and slow-moving

Director: Stephen Daltry

Cast: Kate Winslet, David Kross, Ralph Fiennes

Cert: 16

A curious film of two distinct parts, neither of which makes for a complete finish in that the split when it comes doesn’t carry the viewer from one story to the next with conviction.

Winslet, in excellent form it has to be said, plays the unlikely bus driver Hanna in l950s West Germany who takes in 15-year-old Michael (Kross). He reads to her as she suffers through an illness, and a lustful passion soon takes hold.

One is instantly inclined to wonder why since there is little spark between the characters, little reason shown for such a consuming romance.

And then she vanishes.

And then, while now studying law at university 20 years later, Michael (now played by Fiennes) finds Hanna one of a group of women accused of being SS camp guards. She is defending herself, he thinks he has evidence that will assist her.

Daltry simply fails to make a slow-moving film work … the whole in no way made by the sum of its parts.

Star Rating: 2/5