This is one of the more curious docudramas I’ve seen recently, and it’s still unclear to me what the filmmakers were trying to do. The story, which is well-known, is about the libel suit filed in England by David Irving against Deborah Lipstadt, an American, because she accused him of falsifying his research in order to prove that the holocaust never happened. It is well-known that he lost the suit, so the drama depends upon our interest in the lives of the major players.

The talent, in collaboration, is formidable: David Hare, one of England’s top dramatists, adapted from Lipstadt’s book; Mick Jackson, of The Bodyguard, was director; and the cast included Rachel Weisz as Lipstadt, Tom Wilkinson as the barrister defending her and Timothy Spall as Irving. And yet, with such a fascinating subject, as explored by such an array of artists, the result is barely more than anemic.

The acting is on the high level we expect from these stars. The fact that Spall’s Irving is rather opaque and insubstantial is not the actor’s fault. The filmmakers didn’t seem to want to make him recognizably human anyway. Perhaps they felt he’d bring a libel suit.

But really, the most interesting point the film makes is that Lipstadt only won because the judge was not required to   rule on whether the holocaust actually did happen, only on whether Irving lied in his research. This is pointed out as different from American libel law, where truth can be an absolute defense. In England, you can be guilty of libel if you wrongfully accuse someone of being a liar; the accused has the burden of proof that there was an actual intent to deceive, and not simply that the person was wrong. Lipstadt is advised to limit the issue to just that, i.e., proving Irving’s deceitful intent and practices, and not whether the holocaust actually happened. It is Lipstadt’s outraged and painful protestations against this strategy that gives us the drama in the story.

Weisz presents Lipstadt as forthright and dedicated on this point. She believes that to fail to include the testimony of actual survivors at the trial would be such an insult to the memory of those who were murdered as to be unthinkable. But British wisdom and rectitude prevail. Lipstadt relents, and her team limits the focus to Irving’s distortion of the historical facts, and only that. That way the Judge wouldn’t feel forced into a position he’s not qualified to defend. He’s no historian, they say, and much of the evidence about the holocaust remains in dispute. It would take years to document, and many errors would taint the record. But the judge is an expert on liars, and can find that Irving is one with confidence.

There, I’ve just summarized the entire dramatic conflict in this story. The survivors don’t get to testify, the Judge rules for Lipstadt, and Irving is humiliated. But the scenes are lined up like the station stops on a subway route – with no unexpected delays. The dialogue and direction are predictable and unconvincing. Real people don’t talk to each other to fill in “gaps” in narrative background, and the actors can’t make any of it seem less than artificial. The only scenes requiring nuance at all are those where Weisz and Wilkinson are alone together. They come across, finally, as just two real people who have a genuine difference of opinion. They loosen up, drink some wine, and start to see the other’s point of view. Unfortunately, you’re reminded of why the rest of the film fails to get you as involved as these few scenes do.

It was at some point in the second hour, I think, that I fantasized the late Leo McKern (bless him) as Rumpole, lumbering into the courtroom, replete with barrister wig and cigar. He would make short shrift of Irving on the stand, leaving him a babbling, incoherent wreck. I didn’t care that this never happened. Aside from it being fun, it would at least be something that surprised me. Unlike this literate, faithful and respectful film, which just seemed to flutter past my face, and disappear.