Denial

Movie Review #297 DENIAL.

Courtroom drama based on the defamation lawsuit brought by Holocaust denier David Irving against Deborah Lipstadt and her publisher Penguin Books. Lipstadt's book Denying the Holocaust according to Irving had defamed him for his views that the Holocaust and any role Hitler may have had in Jewish persecution was largely false.

So sets the scene for a lengthy trial quite nicely portrayed in this slightly overlong rendition which does however create in the viewer a sense of strong support for Lipstadt by virtue of generating such a distaste for Irving.

Timothy Spall, one of my favourite British actors is Irving while Rachel Weisz is the feisty but somewhat nervous Lipstadt & both are top notch. However I'd say equally as good was the performance by Tom Wilkinson as lead defence attorney Richard Rampton, who at one point had us convinced he'd fluffed it only to emerge victorious by sticking with his original strategy despite Lipstadt's attempts to sway otherwise.

Does getting you thinking about the whole freedom of speech thing though and how, no matter how distasteful we might find an opposing view, there is always a seed of doubt sown when weighing up each perspective.

Overall 8/10.