Embracing Convention

Taking on too-familiar cop drama "Brooklyn's Finest," Oscar-nominated "The Secret of Kells" and more.

In a funny way, stakes also are the problem plaguing “The Secret of Kells,” the tale of Brendan, a medieval boy monk who wishes to illuminate sacred books though he’s forbidden by his overprotective uncle. Taking its visual and storytelling cues from the 9th Century tomes its characters scribe, the Irish import tackles its hero’s quest to fulfill his calling with a clear-hearted simplicity that, though admirable, sacrifices some of the magic that impels him.

A slow-moving picture book, it’s undeniably lovely, swirling with gold and Crayola-bright shapes that shimmer in and out of focus. But though it serves as a refreshingly unadorned counterpoint to the other, more built-up entries in this year’s Oscar animated feature category, this doggedly 2D feature falls a little too flat. Brendan may want to make these books, but we don’t necessarily get the sense that we’d want to read them ourselves.

Although (or perhaps because) I grew up in a Jewish-American family, I tend to resist the glut of Holocaust-related films. At this point, I am always afraid to ask aloud, what else is there to say? But few take on the question of how contemporary German families navigate their Nazi legacies, especially with the unblinking candor of “Harlan: In the Shadow of ‘Jew Süss.’ “ Focusing on the living ancestors of German director Veit Harlan, who directed the Third Reich’s most rabidly anti-Semitic film, filmmaker Felix Moeller reveals the terrific ambivalence and shame many Germans feel today about the actions of their forebears.

A once-lauded director, Harlan was prosecuted (and acquitted) for crimes against humanity at the end of the war; in interviews, his children and grandchildren range from apologists who defend the director as a true artist forced into producing such propaganda to those who only can express horror that they descended from such a man. At times, it’s hard to stomach the rationalization and love some of Harlan’s descendants express, particularly when intercut with rare archival footage and film excerpts that reveal just how onerous the director’s “work of art” really was.

Also hard to stomach is the account of how Harlan himself came to feel about his WWII body of work, but it is the full-frontal honesty that resuscitates this genre. Though this documentary suffers from a PBS-style orchestration, it raises worthy, universal questions: namely, what does it take for us to admit that we were wrong? and, most compellingly, how can we grapple with the terrible legacy of someone whom we have loved since before we had a choice?

Lisa Rosman is our guest critic for the month of March.

“Brooklyn’s Finest” opens wide on March 5th; “The Secret of Kells” opens in New York March 5th, with other markets to follow; “Harlan: In the Shadow of ‘Jew Süss’ “ opens in New York today, with other markets to follow

[Additional photo: "Harlan: In the Shadow of 'Jew Süss,' " Zeitgeist Films, 2010]

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