Our take
Here’s a based-on-a-true-story courtroom drama that transcends the limits of its genre by virtue of an incisive and unexpectedly prescient script. Twenty years before 2016 sent us hurtling through the looking glass and into a post-truth era, the idea that you could deny the facts as you pleased teetered terrifyingly on the brink of legitimacy when author David Irving (a suitably odious Timothy Spall) brought a UK libel suit against Deborah Lipstadt (Rachel Weisz), an academic whom he claimed had defamed him for calling him exactly what he was: a Holocaust denier.
The case was complicated by the fact that, at the time, the UK placed the burden of proof on the defendant — in other words, Lipstadt’s hotshot legal team needed to prove that the Holocaust happened and that Irving had wilfully misrepresented evidence demonstrating this. Denial captures that terrifying farcicality and the defense’s cleverly counterintuitive strategy: not allowing Lipstadt or Holocaust survivors to speak. If that sounds unsatisfying — this is the rare courtroom drama with no grandstanding speech from the protagonist — that’s the point, something the film’s title cleverly alludes to. Perhaps unexpectedly, Denial’s relevance has ballooned since its release, a fact that might hobble its hopeful ending but that only makes the rest all the more powerful.
Synopsis
Acclaimed writer and historian Deborah E. Lipstadt must battle for historical truth to prove the Holocaust actually occurred when David Irving, a renowned denier, sues her for libel.
Storyline
Holocaust denier David Irving sues academic Deborah Lipstadt for libel, thereby putting the onus on her legal team to prove that the Holocaust happened.
TLDR
Our sympathies with Timothy Spall, who probably had to shower for a month straight to feel right again after playing this role.
What stands out
The double meaning of its title adds unexpected depths to Denial. Deborah struggles to accept the reasoning behind the defense’s strategy, which she sees as denying her a chance to speak for herself — a denial that also disrupts our expectations of the film’s courtroom scenes, which are usually a barnstorming climax of dramatic flair in movies like this. As Deborah’s lawyer Richard Rampton (Tom Wilkinson) puts it, though, “The problem is, what feels best isn’t always what works best.” Rather than adhere to the defense’s rather uncinematic approach out of a sense of duty to the facts, Denial acknowledges the tension between our emotional instincts and the cold logic of the defense’s strategy and makes it a central point of the film — a very clever touch that helps to elevate Denial above the usual uninspired treatment true stories get when they’re adapted into cinema.