This is one of the best movies ever made — right up until the last twenty minutes. It doesn’t just slightly unravel toward the end, it lands with a dense thud. The screenplay, so smart and sophisticated, basically becomes “E.T.” I actually don’t mind the delivery of the famous “I could have done so much more!” speech at the end. I think it is earned and well-delivered (Liam Neeson is brilliant throughout, as is Kingsley and Fiennes) but one can’t deny that it is there for the audience: yes, there is cruelty in the world but so long as you go to a serious movie once in a while and have a good cry you are absolved. But let’s not dwell on that. The first forty-five minutes (there is no brutality at all in the first forty-five minutes) is actually a fascinating look at free markets through the eyes of a war profiteer. It makes you think Dick Cheney may soon have a change of heart. Despite all the hoopla, “Schindler’s List” is at its best when it sticks to a strict character portrait of Schindler. The grander tableau of holocaust atrocity, in a way, undercuts his story. I didn’t notice it the first time, but I noticed it tonight. And, frankly, the knot in my stomach during the atrocities wasn’t too bad — maybe its the great B & W photography. Polanski’s “The Pianist” gave me a headache for at least a day, and Tim Blake Nelson’s “The Grey Zone” — the most brutal holocaust film ever — made me sick for almost a week. Seriously. Anyway, the movie is still a remarkable achievement and I am glad I revisited it (although I also scoff at Ben Kingsley holding “The List” like the tablets of the Ten Commandments — something else I missed the first go round). If you’re like me and haven’t seen it since the theaters, rent it.