The Stranger

My mother named our pet dachshund Oskar after the main character in The Tin Drum, Günter Grass’s dark and disturbing novel about a 3-year-old boy who responds to the horrors of Nazi Germany by deciding never to grow up. I hadn’t realized how totally fucked up that was until I saw the Oscar-winning 1979 film, an equally disturbing masterpiece that still haunts me three decades later. As does the remarkable performance of 11-year-old David Bennent, who impossibly plays Oskar from in utero to stunted adulthood. (SIFF Film Center, Seattle Center Northwest Rooms, siff.net, 4:30 pm, $11) by Goldy

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