Oliver Twist

Charles Dickens‘ story of an orphan was made into a film many times, but Polanski's version still fills a gap. Because many adaptations have not aged well: for instance, the anti-Semitic caricature of the moneygrubbing Fagin is carried over from the book into David Lean's 1948 black-and-white film. Polanski mitigates the anti-Semitism with the help of the marvelous Ben Kingsley, but otherwise sticks reasonably close to the original. His OLIVER TWIST is neither a dusty period drama nor a modernized reinterpretation. »This is the rare case of the film version of a great novel where watching is like reading,« wrote one American critic.