Denial

Based on events leading up to and including the 2000 trial where American Jewish academic Deborah Lipstadt was sued for libel by Holocaust-denying British historian David Irving, this thought-provoking film brings factual weight to a narrative as gripping as any fictional courtroom drama. Lipstadt (Rachel Weisz) is advised by her legal team to use the case as an opportunity to denounce Irving's work, although she is reluctant to, in her own words, "put the Holocaust on trial." David Hare's script, based on Lipstadt's book, is responsible and rarely preachy, paying close attention to historical detail without drowning in legalese. Weisz's portrayal occasionally veers towards a parody of New York Jewish abrasiveness, but it's neatly counterbalanced by more grounded work from Timothy Spall as the arrogant and unapologetic Irving and, especially, Tom Wilkinson as Lipstadt's wise and level-headed (if mildly eccentric) barrister Richard Rampton.