The Young Karl Marx

A young journalist exiled across Europe in the 1840s meets the son of a factory-owning family in Manchester. They begin writing together and fall out with the existing workers' organisations. Rather than explaining the ideas the film uses scenes of argument; the narrative mainly shows the daily poverty of the two men and their partners, the moves from city to city, and the struggle with censorship. The closing gives the effect of the texts on the following century in documentary footage. Raoul Peck directed, with August Diehl and Stefan Konarske, and Vicky Krieps in the cast. The dialogue runs in German, French and English. Who it's for: those interested in the history of ideas and in period drama. Who it's not for: viewers wanting action; the film is almost entirely argument.