Reader Dispute

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The Hollywood Reporter's Steven Zeitchik is reporting that producers Harvey Weinstein and Scott Rudin are strongly disagreeing about whether to release the Weinstein Co. war-crimes drama The Reader in 2008 or wait until '09.

"Weinstein is pushing for a December release for the movie, which director Stephen Daldry is working on in post," Zeitchik writes. "The romance set in postwar Germany and based on Bernhard Schlink's novel already has buzz from strong test screenings, though there are post elements left to be completed."

"Rudin, however, has been lobbying hard for a 2009 release. The producer already has two Oscar candidates -- Revolutionary Road, with Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet as a married couple in the 1950s, at Paramount Vantage, and the Broadway transfer Doubt, toplining Meryl Streep and Philip Seymour Hoffman, at Miramax -- and a third would mean he is vying heavily against himself."

To go by the book synopsis, The Reader is a German-guilt movie rooted in World War II. Due respect and no offense, but it sounds like a movie that could have been released in 1979 or 1982 or 1989 or 1996. It costars Ralph Fiennes, Kate Winslet, Alexandra Maria Lara and Bruno Ganz.