Doubt / The Reader / The Wrestler

Finally catching up on 2008's Oscar contenders and winners...

Doubt


Can't think of a better title than Doubt for this film because the film's intention is to keep us in doubt all the way through. At the film's heart is the suspicion that Hauffman, a priest, has behaved improperly with one of the students in his school. While the priest pleads innocence, a nun(Meryl Streep), who has her own axe to grind with the priest, is convinced of the priest's guilt and another nun(Amy Adams) is caught in the crossfire. But unlike most movies, Doubt never lets us in on what really happened. We get hints in the form of past issues, we see the behavior of the principal characters and we hear the opinions of the characters as to what happened. But we never get to know what actually transpired. So, based on who we believe and how we interpret the happenings, we are expected to come to our own conclusions. That is both the film's strength and weakness. While it constantly keeps us thinking and guessing, it feels distant and vague because of the lack of catharsis. Overall though, it works mainly because of the performances and the script. Streep is phenomenal as the strict nun while Hauffman alternately earns our confidence and raises our suspicions with a natural performance. Amy Adams shines as a meek nun who gradually gains the confidence to stand up for what she believes in. Viola Davis has a small role as the boy's mother but her emotional speech to Streep is a scene-stealer.

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The Reader

Exploration of feelings of guilt and redemption is one of Hollywood's favorite themes. The Reader is one more film to tackle the topic and it does so powerfully and touchingly against the backdrop of the Holocaust. Kate Winslet plays a ticket collector on a tram in Germany. After saving a 15-year-old-boy(David Kross) who falls ill in front of her building, she begins to have a passionate affair with him. She disappears from his life one day and when he sees again a few years later, she is on trial for the murder of Jews while working as an SS guard. The Winslet-Kross affair is morally wrong but the questions it raises pale in comparison to those that come up later. The heart of the movie is their meeting a few years later and the film throws up some complex questions as Kross learns about the horrific past of the woman he was in love with. The film's key point comes when Kross realizes something about Winslet that could save her. The way he treats the information tells us about the tough choice he has made while Winslet's admittance tells us that she is seeking redemption more from herself than from the court. Both of them get another chance at redemption at the end and their actions tell us how much they have changed. Winslet was an SS guard and later has an affair with a young boy but still earns our sympathy on the strength of her performance. Her responses in court convey her frame of mind and though they don't humanize her completely, they do help us understand her thought process. Kross is intense and Ralph Fiennes is perfect as the man who has become emotionally barren because of his past.

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The Wrestler



The Wrestler is an emotional, touching story that looks at the sunset years of a man who has made a lot of mistakes and is trying to fix them but not always succeeding. Mickey Rourke plays a professional wrestler who was popular 20 years ago. He is now making money wrestling in exhibition matches but when a heart attack puts a stop to that, he is forced to reassesses his priorities in life. So he tries to reconnect with his daughter and strikes up a friendship with a stripper(Marisa Tomei). The film is a no-frills look at the life of a man who is past his prime and is trying to come to terms with it. It is emotional but never overly melodramatic. Rourke creates a sympathetic figure who was in the limelight but is now alone and lonely and yearns for company. We cheer for him when he appears to be setting things right(like during his stint in the deli counter) and feel sad when things once again derail(he only has himself to blame though). The behind-the-scenes peeks at wrestling are fascinating and confirm some questions we have while surprising us with other revelations of what goes on before and after those matches. Marisa Tomei is good as the stripper who is kinda in the same place as Rourke.