Tales of first love have always been fodder for movies, from 21 Candles, to The Little Mermaid and Milo & Otis (a film I vomited in when I saw it as a child), to The Notebook. But Stephen Daldry's The Reader is a film about first love that throws a few new elements into the mix, namely Nazis and pedophilia (with not a goblet of Jesus juice or a ranch with a theme park in site). David Cross nearly steals the show, with a stern and button-downed Winslet very deserving of the Oscar. Who ever did her old lady make-up (read as grey face-paint applied by a vengeful monkey) should be made to watch the Curious Case of Benjamin Button.
But The Reader does however prove two things, one: both Milo & Otis and The Notebook would've been far more interesting if they had featured stern Nazi ladies, and two: reading is a great aphrodisiac.
