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There are films about the Holocaust that assault you with horror, and there are films that approach from a quieter angle, asking you to sit, listen, and be changed. Finn Taylor\u2019s THE OPTIMIST: THE BRAVEST ACT OF TRUTH belongs firmly in the latter camp. It is a work of deep reverence\u2014for history, for truth, and above all for one man, Herbert Heller, yet it ultimately blossoms into something tender, hopeful, and unexpectedly life-affirming.<\/p>\n
At the heart of THE OPTIMIST is Herbert Heller, a Czech Jewish boy from Prague who survives Terez\u00edn and Auschwitz, and the older man he becomes decades later in Northern California. It\u2019s clear that Taylor never wanted Herbert to be framed simply as a victim, or even as a conventional \u201cinspirational\u201d figure. Taylor himself has described Herbert Heller as \u201ca different kind of hero, the kind of hero we really need right now, that leads with compassion and depth and understanding and grace.\u201d<\/p>\n
That phrase quietly defines the film. Rather than focusing on spectacle or on the machinery of genocide, Taylor orients the entire story around Herbert\u2019s moral and emotional presence\u2014how he listens, how he comforts, how he gently reaches out to a contemporary teenager, Abby, who feels her own world collapsing. The film\u2019s title is not a sentimental cover. It is a statement of character. Herbert Heller has seen \u201cthe end of the world\u201d and chooses, again and again, not to give up on humanity.<\/p>\n
Taylor\u2019s casting of Herbert in both timelines is crucial to that effect. As the older Herbert, Stephen Lang is a revelation. Better known on screen for his hard-edged, macho roles in \u201cAvatar\u201d or \u201cDon\u2019t Breathe\u201d, Lang is here cast deliberately against type. While there are many actors who would have seemed a more obvious fit\u2014men who already read as \u201cHolocaust survivor\u201d at a glance, Lang was an inspired choice as he delivers a completely chameleon-like portrayal of Heller – an individual, a real person.<\/p>\n
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Lang disappears into Herbert with such humility that, according to Taylor, even the Heller family was stunned by the portrayal. The performance is gentle, often fragile, yet suffused with a core of quiet strength. A small anecdote from set says it all as in my exclusive interview with him, Taylor recalled instinctively putting a steadying hand under Lang\u2019s arm as they walked down a muddy path\u2014only to feel the actor\u2019s massive bicep under his costume. The strongman is still there, but in THE OPTIMIST that strength is redirected inward, toward compassion.<\/p>\n
As young Herbert, Luke David Blumm is the kind of discovery most directors can only hope for. The role is technically punishing\u2014often performed inches from a wide-angle lens\u2014and emotionally demanding, carrying the boy through bewilderment, terror, stubborn resolve, and flickers of joy. Blumm never strains; he simply inhabits Herbert, making the child\u2019s experience feel acutely present rather than historical abstraction.\u00a0 Blumm carries the weight of young Herbert, and the film, on his shoulders.\u00a0 If we don’t understand and believe the once joyous child within and the hardships and torturous conditions he then survived, we will not believe Lang’s performance as the older Herbert and his optimistic outlook on life.\u00a0 Luke David Blumm captivates.<\/p>\n
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What makes THE OPTIMIST so quietly powerful is not just who it is about, but how it is told. Taylor\u2019s filmmaking is careful, restrained, and rigorously thought through, always in service of point of view and emotional truth.<\/p>\n
Visually, Taylor divides the film between two worlds. In the United States, where the elderly Herbert lives among the Northern California redwoods, US cinematographer Antonio Riestra leans into a natural, sometimes handheld intimacy.\u00a0 In Europe, by contrast, cinematographer Alexandra \u201cSasha\u201d Cirul works in and around Prague, Terez\u00edn, and a purpose-built Auschwitz. The Czech studio, Stillking Films, which hosts blockbuster franchises like \u201cMission: Impossible\u201d and \u201cSpider-Man\u201d, \u201cbent over backwards\u201d for THE OPTIMIST because it was about one of their own, Herbert Heller from Prague. The studio built Auschwitz. The team was allowed to shoot in the actual Terezin.:<\/p>\n
Finn Taylor builds a remarkably coherent visual grammar for THE OPTIMIST by rooting every choice in point of view, geography, and emotion. By splitting the shoot between America and Europe, using Antonio Riestra for the redwood ringed present and Alexandra \u201cSasha\u201d Cirul for Prague, Terez\u00edn, and Auschwitz, Herbert\u2019s Californian refuge stands in stark visual contrast to the death camps.\u00a0 In the U.S. material, Taylor leans into the looser, sometimes handheld intimacy\u2014most notably in the early interview scenes, where the slight instability of the camera mirrors Herbert\u2019s nervousness\u2014while the European sequences are more composed and historically grounded.\u00a0 Determined to see the world through young Herbert\u2019s eyes, Taylor shoots with wide Cooke prime lenses, often inches from the boy\u2019s face, keeping his expressions close while leaving the joy, the Nazi menace, and the camp reality crisply visible behind him. Blocking and angle shifts quietly track character arcs.\u00a0 Abbey and Herbert move from opposite sides of the frame to sitting shoulder to shoulder as the camera creeps closer, while low angles on young Herbert gradually level out as he gains footing in an unforgiving world.<\/p>\n
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The Holocaust sequences are grounded in a strict visual logic: we experience the past overwhelmingly from young Herbert\u2019s perspective. Taylor chooses wide Cooke primes, staying close to the boy\u2019s face while keeping the world behind him in perfect focus. This approach has a devastating subtlety. Herbert\u2019s expressions anchor us emotionally, but the camps, the uniforms, the cruelty are never softened or blurred. They are the environment he must navigate, sharply legible but never allowed to eclipse his humanity.<\/p>\n
Blocking and composition reinforce the emotional arcs. In the present-day story, Abby and Herbert begin seated apart, with the camera holding them at a distance, then gradually drift closer until they are side by side, and the framing tightens. Young Herbert, meanwhile, is initially shot from a child\u2019s low angle, looking up at adult figures. As he ages, matures, and adapts, the camera subtly rises to meet him at eye level. Without fanfare, the film charts both a deepening relationship and the hard-won growth of a child forced into impossible circumstances.<\/p>\n
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The score, by Rob Berger and violinist composer Jenny Scheinman, is another quiet strength. Taylor treats music as an extension of character and agency rather than mere emotional wallpaper. In early chase scenes\u2014such as the day Herbert first wears his yellow star and is shunned by his friends\u2014the violin tremolo feels almost like an invisible hand pushing him forward, rather than pinning him down in fear.<\/p>\n
Songs are used sparingly but with purpose. A Jeff Tweedy track, \u201cLove Is the King,\u201d first appears over contemporary images of Abby and Herbert in the woods, then carries over into Herbert\u2019s return to Prague, linking their experiences across decades. Such choices help the film maintain its dual \u201cpresent to present\u201d structure. The past is not a sepia-toned dream, but something Herbert is reliving in the now each time he speaks.<\/p>\n
Scheinman\u2019s work carries its own moral weight. At one point, she based a cue for an Auschwitz sequence on a historic Jewish bridal song, then reconsidered and consulted a rabbi. When he advised against repurposing the melody in that context, she discarded the cue and composed something new. In a film that is always balancing beauty against atrocity, that kind of ethical self-correction matters. (As a sidenote, Scheinman is the granddaughter of Telford Taylor, the head US prosecutor at the Nuremberg trials.)<\/p>\n