Film | Neu
Germany • Austria • Switzerland
January 23 –29,2009
Landmark’s E Street Cinema
Politics takes a back seat to storytelling, both dramatic and comedic, in the 2009 edition of Film|Neu, the 17th annual round-up of distinctive German-language cinema from Germany, Austria and Switzerland.
Genre fans will want to catch Christian Petzold’s masterful JERICHOW on opening night and Austrian veteran Goetz Spielmann’s Oscar-submitted REVANCHE later in the series, both of which take differing approaches to contemporary European film noir. Switzerland-based director Micha Lewinsky’s gentle THE FRIEND leads the dramatic charge (it too represents its country at the next Academy Awards), followed closely by the confrontational THE WAVE. Issues raised by the thought-provoking A HERO’S WELCOME are leavened somewhat by the quasi-musical whimsy at the heart of MELODIES OF SPRING. Non-fiction filmmaking is represented triumphantly by the sports documentary FOOTBALL UNDERCOVER, which preserves the Tehran-set match between women’s soccer clubs from Berlin’s Kreuzberg section and Iran. Finally, the old guard makes a fine showing by virtue of Doris Dörrie’s charming and novelistic CHERRY BLOSSOMS: HANAMI, as well as Wim Wenders’ Cannes competition entry PALERMO SHOOTING.
If there’s a theme here, it’s that German-speaking people have pretty much the same dilemmas, challenges and joys as their American brethren. And isn’t that what art, and cultural exchange, are all about?—Eddie Cockrell
Eddie Cockrell is an independent film critic who divides his time between his hometown of Washington, D.C. and Sydney, Australia.
