Rachel Weisz stars in a scene from the movie "Denial." The Catholic News Service classification is A-III -- adults. (CNS/Bleecker Street)

By Catholic News Service

A prominent attempt to erase one of history’s most notorious genocides — and the possible strategies for defeating that effort — are explored in this morally powerful fact-based drama.

Director Mick Jackson recounts the case for libel initiated in 1996 by British writer David Irving (Timothy Spall) against American historian Deborah Lipstadt (Rachel Weisz) after Lipstadt labeled Irving a Holocaust denier. David Hare’s script mostly avoids courtroom histrionics in favor of delineating how the defense arguments boring in on Irving’s false theories were constructed. He also shows how Lipstadt, a professor of Jewish history at Emory University in Atlanta, misunderstood her legal team’s tactics nearly to the end of the trial.

Detailed discussions of atrocities, a single rough term. The Catholic News Service classification is A-III — adults. The Motion Picture Association of America rating is PG-13 — parents strongly cautioned. Some material may be inappropriate for children under 13.

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