Does “The Reader” trivialize the Holocaust?

The upcoming Weinstein Co. movie, directed by Stephen Daldry, stars Kate Winslet as a Nazi concentration camp guard accused of incinerat ing 300 Jews, and is being pushed for Oscar consid eration. But the images that will stick in some viewers’ memories will be full-frontal sex scenes. After a recent screening for such in tellectuals as John Guare, Frank McCourt and Bartle Bull, Daldry sub jected himself to a Q&A, during which art critic Charlie Finch said, “I think this is a dishonest, manipulative film.” Daldry replied, “I am sorry you feel that way.” Finch said that a little-seen movie like last summer’s searing concentration camp epic, “The Counterfeiters,” will be crowded out by Daldry’s picture. Daldry airily replied, “There are 225 films about the Holocaust. There is room for mine.” Finch told Page Six, “What is espe cially repellent is the use of Kate Win slet’s nubile body to create sympathy for a repellent character, whose triumph over illiteracy somehow mitigates un speakable crimes which are never actu ally depicted on-screen.”

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