GOETHE FILMS: The Universal Theory

GOETHE FILMS: World on a Wire

Presented by the Goethe-Institut

In The Universal Theory (Germany, Austria, Switzerland, 118min) quantum mechanics becomes a language for cinema itself: parallel worlds aren't just theory but viscerally present. Set against the intellectual fever of a 1962 physics conference in the Swiss Alps, this haunting noir thriller channels Hitchcock's Vertigo and Lynch's uncanny dread to explore how observation collapses possibility into catastrophe. As doctoral student Johannes witnesses reality fracture around a mysterious jazz pianist and mounting Cold War paranoia, the film becomes a meditation on converging crises: scientific hubris, geopolitical apocalypse, and the dissolution of singular truth. Shot in lush black-and-white that evokes both postwar German cinema and the stark uncertainty of quantum states, Kröger crafts what might be called "Schrödinger's film noir"—a work that exists in multiple genres simultaneously until the viewer's gaze forces it into one devastating outcome.

• In competition for the Golden Lion at the 80th Venice International Film Festival

• Venice Film Festival 2023 Winner Bisato d’Oro Best Film & Golden Lion Nominee

• German Film Awards for Best Cinematography, Best Production, Best Visual Effects

Born in 1985, Timm Kröger studied at the European Film College in Ebeltoft, Denmark, and the Film Academy Baden-Württemberg, first in the visual design/camera program, then in the documentary film directing department.
His graduation film Zerrumpelt Herz celebrated its world premiere at the Venice Film Festival in 2014, as did his sophomore feature The Universal Theory nearly a decade laster. Kröger works as a writer, director, editor, colorist, and cinematographer.

Part of series: GOETHE FILMS: World on a Wire


Part of the program (re)Open Minds: Adapting to the Future