Toto is an esteemed Holocaust scholar. He is also the grandson of a Nazi war criminal. While organizing a conference, Toto takes on an intern who’s the granddaughter of a Holocaust victim. After a rocky meet-cute, the two bond, speak candidly about their familial legacies, and stumble toward romance. Which may or may not be a problem for the married—yet ostensibly impotent—Toto.

Chris Kraus’ audacious The Bloom of Yesterday wrings comedy from unfathomable atrocity. Yet the film’s lightness allows its inherent gravity to settle fully once we apprehend its true message: that every generation must find its own path to reckoning with the daunting shadows of history.