Following the international acclaim of “Babylon Berlin,” XFilme Creative Pool, in partnership with Beta Film, debuted excerpts from its newest drama series, “House of Promises,” scoring on Sunday MipDrama’s prestigious Buyers’ Coup de Couer Award.
The 12-part drama, directed by the reputed Sherry Hormann (“Desert Flower”) and Umut Dag (“Vienna Blood”) for bullishly growing SVOD service Rtl Plus, centers on its female protagonists, giving breath to their histories and the tide-shift taking place in the ‘20s that allowed them to chase their passions and ambitions fiercely.
“House of Promises” is the female perspective of the Golden 20s. The center of our series isn’t only a love story, it’s about love on all levels. Romantic love, love within a family. It’s about the failure of love, about friendship and love between women,” Hormann notes.
“Our vision is to dive into daily life at this time. Telling facts...
The 12-part drama, directed by the reputed Sherry Hormann (“Desert Flower”) and Umut Dag (“Vienna Blood”) for bullishly growing SVOD service Rtl Plus, centers on its female protagonists, giving breath to their histories and the tide-shift taking place in the ‘20s that allowed them to chase their passions and ambitions fiercely.
“House of Promises” is the female perspective of the Golden 20s. The center of our series isn’t only a love story, it’s about love on all levels. Romantic love, love within a family. It’s about the failure of love, about friendship and love between women,” Hormann notes.
“Our vision is to dive into daily life at this time. Telling facts...
- 4/4/2022
- by Holly Jones
- Variety Film + TV
The 7th MipDrama – an industry centrepiece at Cannes MipTV trade fair – wrapped with Germany’s “House of Promises” scooping the prestigious Buyers’ Coup de Coeur award.
The romantic drama proved the clear favorite among the MipDrama audience gathered in the Debussy Theatre at Cannes’ Palais des Festivals, receiving the most rapturous applause of the day following its presentation.
The 12-episode series stars Naemi Feitisch, Ludwig Simon – also seen in Amazon’s Prime Video series “Beat” – Alexander Scheer and Nina Kunzendorf, fresh off hit Viaplay Original “Furia.”
Set in Berlin, “House of Promises” explores the eventful story behind the legendary credit department store Jonass, founded in the 1920s in a building which has now become Berlin’s Soho House.
While the times are hard, marked by poverty and hardship, the protagonists of “House of Promises” still dream of a better future. Including Vicky (Feitisch), a headstrong young woman desperate to earn...
The romantic drama proved the clear favorite among the MipDrama audience gathered in the Debussy Theatre at Cannes’ Palais des Festivals, receiving the most rapturous applause of the day following its presentation.
The 12-episode series stars Naemi Feitisch, Ludwig Simon – also seen in Amazon’s Prime Video series “Beat” – Alexander Scheer and Nina Kunzendorf, fresh off hit Viaplay Original “Furia.”
Set in Berlin, “House of Promises” explores the eventful story behind the legendary credit department store Jonass, founded in the 1920s in a building which has now become Berlin’s Soho House.
While the times are hard, marked by poverty and hardship, the protagonists of “House of Promises” still dream of a better future. Including Vicky (Feitisch), a headstrong young woman desperate to earn...
- 4/3/2022
- by Marta Balaga
- Variety Film + TV
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By Doug Oswald
A concentration camp survivor returns home after the war only to find betrayal and deceit in “Phoenix,” a Blu-ray release from Criterion. Nina Hoss is Nelly Lenz, a German Jew returning to Berlin in 1945 both physically and psychologically damaged after years in concentration camps including the notorious Auschwitz death camp. A successful nightclub singer prior to the horrors of Nazi Germany, she returns home with a disfigured face hidden under bandages when we first meet her on screen. Nelly is aided by her friend Lene Winter (Nina Kunzendorf), a fellow German Jew who fled to England before the war. Nelly receives reconstructive surgery on her face which alters her looks, although we never see what she looked liked prior to her facial disfigurement. We first see her after the bandages are removed post surgery.
Nelly wants to be reunited with her husband,...
By Doug Oswald
A concentration camp survivor returns home after the war only to find betrayal and deceit in “Phoenix,” a Blu-ray release from Criterion. Nina Hoss is Nelly Lenz, a German Jew returning to Berlin in 1945 both physically and psychologically damaged after years in concentration camps including the notorious Auschwitz death camp. A successful nightclub singer prior to the horrors of Nazi Germany, she returns home with a disfigured face hidden under bandages when we first meet her on screen. Nelly is aided by her friend Lene Winter (Nina Kunzendorf), a fellow German Jew who fled to England before the war. Nelly receives reconstructive surgery on her face which alters her looks, although we never see what she looked liked prior to her facial disfigurement. We first see her after the bandages are removed post surgery.
Nelly wants to be reunited with her husband,...
- 1/16/2022
- by nospam@example.com (Cinema Retro)
- Cinemaretro.com
TVNow, Rtl Deutschland’s streaming service, high-flying Berlin-based production house X Filme Creative Pool and production-distribution powerhouse Beta Film are partnering on what looks like one of the biggest German drama series productions of 2021: “House of Promises,” (a working title).
Beta Film is handling world sales and will present first moving images of the series at October’s Mipcom trade fair in Cannes, it said Friday.
Described by Beta Film as a “high-end” and a “visually stunning drama,” the 12-hour series is currently shooting on location in Berlin, Brandenburg and the Saxon city of Görlitz. Set in Berlin in the 1920s, it captures the hopes of a dazzling decade and the dramatic turn of an era from the perspective of a young woman and a Jewish family, owner of a state-of-the-art department store at Berlin’s Torstrasse 1.
Award winning director Sherry Hormann directs episodes 1-6, once again focusing on “complex,...
Beta Film is handling world sales and will present first moving images of the series at October’s Mipcom trade fair in Cannes, it said Friday.
Described by Beta Film as a “high-end” and a “visually stunning drama,” the 12-hour series is currently shooting on location in Berlin, Brandenburg and the Saxon city of Görlitz. Set in Berlin in the 1920s, it captures the hopes of a dazzling decade and the dramatic turn of an era from the perspective of a young woman and a Jewish family, owner of a state-of-the-art department store at Berlin’s Torstrasse 1.
Award winning director Sherry Hormann directs episodes 1-6, once again focusing on “complex,...
- 9/3/2021
- by John Hopewell
- Variety Film + TV
"You're not the only one. We're one big family." Netflix has debuted an official trailer for a German comedy titled Freaks - You're One of Us, a film about ordinary people who discover they have special powers. What an original concept. Not to be confused with the other Freaks film, this one comes from Deutschland. What if for your entire life you had superpowers you weren’t aware of? Tipped by a mysterious tramp, a meek fry cook (or "young working class mom") discovers she has superpowers — and uncovers an unsavory, widespread conspiracy. Others also have powers that have been suppressed by a medication. But why? The film stars Cornelia Gröschel as Wendy, Wotan Wilke Möhring as Marek, and Tim Oliver Schultz as Elmar; Nina Kunzendorf, Frederic Linkemann, Finnlay Berger, Gisa Flake, Ralph Herforth, and Thelma Buabeng. This looks as painfully cheesy and as derivative as they come, nothing really to see here.
- 8/12/2020
- by Alex Billington
- firstshowing.net
With a seemingly endless amount of streaming options — not only the titles at our disposal, but services themselves — we’re highlighting the noteworthy titles that have recently hit platforms. Check out this week’s selections below and an archive of past round-ups here.
Jupiter’s Moon (Kornél Mundruczó)
The juxtaposition of supernatural thriller tropes and urgent socio-political issues in Kornél Mundruczó’s latest movie — an original take on the superhero origin story set to the backdrop of the refugee crisis — might prove a delicate one for some viewers to take. Those unperturbed, however, should find much to relish in Jupiter’s Moon, a film that somewhat lightly plays with themes of religion and immigration as it rumbles, crashes, and ultimately soars through the streets of the Hungarian capital. It’s a tricky balance and Mundruczó (who had a break-out with his canine revolt film White God in 2014) strikes it with style and confidence.
Jupiter’s Moon (Kornél Mundruczó)
The juxtaposition of supernatural thriller tropes and urgent socio-political issues in Kornél Mundruczó’s latest movie — an original take on the superhero origin story set to the backdrop of the refugee crisis — might prove a delicate one for some viewers to take. Those unperturbed, however, should find much to relish in Jupiter’s Moon, a film that somewhat lightly plays with themes of religion and immigration as it rumbles, crashes, and ultimately soars through the streets of the Hungarian capital. It’s a tricky balance and Mundruczó (who had a break-out with his canine revolt film White God in 2014) strikes it with style and confidence.
- 3/8/2019
- by Jordan Raup
- The Film Stage
With a seemingly endless amount of streaming options — not only the titles at our disposal, but services themselves — we’ve taken it upon ourselves to highlight the titles that have recently hit platforms. Every week, one will be able to see the cream of the crop (or perhaps some simply interesting picks) of streaming titles (new and old) across platforms such as Netflix, iTunes, Amazon, and more (note: U.S. only). Check out our rundown for this week’s selections below.
Dunkirk (Christopher Nolan)
In the hours since viewing Dunkirk – the newest film from surprisingly divisive blockbuster director Christopher Nolan – one sensory recollection has stuck out above all others. Every time that British spitfire pilot Farrier (Tom Hardy) accelerates or banks his plane, the soundtrack fills with the noise of metallic rattling, an uncomfortable chorus of knocks and pings that lets you know exactly how much stress and force are...
Dunkirk (Christopher Nolan)
In the hours since viewing Dunkirk – the newest film from surprisingly divisive blockbuster director Christopher Nolan – one sensory recollection has stuck out above all others. Every time that British spitfire pilot Farrier (Tom Hardy) accelerates or banks his plane, the soundtrack fills with the noise of metallic rattling, an uncomfortable chorus of knocks and pings that lets you know exactly how much stress and force are...
- 12/15/2017
- by The Film Stage
- The Film Stage
What's contemporary Europe got that we ain't got? Powerful, serious filmmaking like that by Christian Petzold, starring the impressive Nina Hoss. Their sixth collaboration is a loaded narrative that takes some pretty wild narrative themes -- plastic surgery, hidden identities -- and spins them in a suspenseful new direction. Phoenix Blu-ray The Criterion Collection 809 2014 / Color / 2:39 widescreen (Super 35) / 98 min. / available through The Criterion Collection / Street Date April 26, 2016 / 39.95 Starring Nina Hoss, Ronald Zehrfeld, Nina Kunzendorf, Imogen Kogge. Cinematography Hans Fromm Film Editor Bettina Böhler Original Music Stefan Will Written by Christian Petzold, Haroun Farocki from ideas in the book Le retour des cendres by Hubert Monteilhet Produced by Florian Koerner von Gustorf, Michael Weber Directed by Christian Petzold
Reviewed by Glenn Erickson
I had seen only one Christian Petzold feature before this one. 2012's Barbara is an excellent Deutsche-Millennial thriller starring Barbara Hoss as an East German doctor trying to do...
Reviewed by Glenn Erickson
I had seen only one Christian Petzold feature before this one. 2012's Barbara is an excellent Deutsche-Millennial thriller starring Barbara Hoss as an East German doctor trying to do...
- 5/3/2016
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
Phoenix
Written by Christian Petzold & Harun Farocki
Directed by Christian Petzold
Germany / Poland, 2014
How we identify ourselves is what defines us. For some, it’s their ethnicity or heritage. Others may use physical markers; their face, their mannerisms, the sound of their own voice. If that identity is stripped from us, how will we recognize ourselves? How will others recognize us? Director Christian Petzold’s shattering portrait of a woman adrift in post-wwii Berlin forgoes wishful sentimentality in favor of painful re-discovery. The result is a quietly-devastating film that will haunt you for weeks to come.
Before the war started, Nelly (Nina Hoss) knew exactly who she was. She sang in jazz clubs, accompanied by her husband Johnny (Ronald Zehrfeld) on piano. Johnny is the love her life, despite his obvious failings as a reliable husband. They enjoyed a peaceful existence of holiday retreats to Paris and afternoon luncheons with friends.
Written by Christian Petzold & Harun Farocki
Directed by Christian Petzold
Germany / Poland, 2014
How we identify ourselves is what defines us. For some, it’s their ethnicity or heritage. Others may use physical markers; their face, their mannerisms, the sound of their own voice. If that identity is stripped from us, how will we recognize ourselves? How will others recognize us? Director Christian Petzold’s shattering portrait of a woman adrift in post-wwii Berlin forgoes wishful sentimentality in favor of painful re-discovery. The result is a quietly-devastating film that will haunt you for weeks to come.
Before the war started, Nelly (Nina Hoss) knew exactly who she was. She sang in jazz clubs, accompanied by her husband Johnny (Ronald Zehrfeld) on piano. Johnny is the love her life, despite his obvious failings as a reliable husband. They enjoyed a peaceful existence of holiday retreats to Paris and afternoon luncheons with friends.
- 8/14/2015
- by J.R. Kinnard
- SoundOnSight
A concealed gun, a smoky nightclub, a reconstructed and bandaged face; all of these pulpy elements are set upon a backdrop of post-war Berlin. When described like that Phoenix sounds like a nod to the black and white film-noir genre. But director Christian Petzold is interested in much more. He has his sights on presenting a story of betrayal and intrigue, while placing under the cold and dark imagery a sort-of redemptive hope. Not unlike the name of the nightclub that the film shares its title with. His confident and succinct style works well with the lean story, but I’m not quite sure the story is infused enough with these themes to make much of an impression.
Nelly Lenz (Nina Hoss) is a Holocaust survivor who goes under the knife to correct her deformed features following her mistreatment during the war. Her friend Lene (the wonderful Nina Kunzendorf, whose...
Nelly Lenz (Nina Hoss) is a Holocaust survivor who goes under the knife to correct her deformed features following her mistreatment during the war. Her friend Lene (the wonderful Nina Kunzendorf, whose...
- 8/14/2015
- by Michael Haffner
- WeAreMovieGeeks.com
Return From the Ashes: Petzold’s Compelling Resurrection of WWII Aftermath
At the head of the cinematic movement referred to as the Berlin School of filmmaking is auteur Christian Petzold, an internationally renowned artist whose works have met with increasing critical success and notable visibility. Usually utilizing the talents of his frequent collaborator, German beauty Nina Hoss, the duo has returned with Phoenix, their follow-up to the celebrated 2012 title, Barbara, where it snagged a Best Actress award at the Berlin Film Festival.
While that film examined a predicament in early 80’s East Berlin, Petzold reaches farther back into the troubled tumultuousness of Germany history with his latest feature, set shortly after the end of WWII. The surviving members of Germany’s populace are forced to contend with restructuring via the help of outside military sources, as well as dealing with the returning survivors of the concentration camps. Like most of Petzold’s films,...
At the head of the cinematic movement referred to as the Berlin School of filmmaking is auteur Christian Petzold, an internationally renowned artist whose works have met with increasing critical success and notable visibility. Usually utilizing the talents of his frequent collaborator, German beauty Nina Hoss, the duo has returned with Phoenix, their follow-up to the celebrated 2012 title, Barbara, where it snagged a Best Actress award at the Berlin Film Festival.
While that film examined a predicament in early 80’s East Berlin, Petzold reaches farther back into the troubled tumultuousness of Germany history with his latest feature, set shortly after the end of WWII. The surviving members of Germany’s populace are forced to contend with restructuring via the help of outside military sources, as well as dealing with the returning survivors of the concentration camps. Like most of Petzold’s films,...
- 7/28/2015
- by Nicholas Bell
- IONCINEMA.com
Survival tales set during the Second World War and around the Nazi era, have been the social environment of many a film. The horrors of the Holocaust and the madness of an ideology shattered an entire nation’s culture, and damaged it to the point of necessary re-creation. As far as movies go, it’s a milieu that will never get old, but one that can feel stale with a certain, typical, style of direction. On the other hand, when you have a filmmaker with a deep understanding of what makes films breathe and an uncanny capability for absolute control, a familiar canvass can be an advantage. This is precisely what it is for German auteur Christian Petzold and his extravagant, eloquent and deeply effective film, “Phoenix.” The story is set in post-war Berlin, ravaged by war and still very much lurking in the shadows of distorted principles, where Jewish...
- 7/24/2015
- by Nikola Grozdanovic
- The Playlist
In Christian Petzold’s Phoenix, the tall, blonde German actress Nina Hoss plays Nelly Lenz, a Jewish nightclub singer who survives a concentration camp — despite being shot in the face by the Nazis and left for dead — and returns to a rubbled postwar Berlin in search of her non-Jewish husband, Johnny (Ronald Zehrfeld). This is Hoss’s sixth film with Petzold (most recently, she was a battered wife in Yella and a persecuted East German doctor in Barbara), and it’s not the first time that she has played a traumatized ghost. The Holocaust has obliterated not only Nelly’s face but also her identity, her sense of self, her place in the world. Her friend Lene (Nina Kunzendorf) insists that it was Johnny who gave Nelly up to the Nazis to save his own life and that she should leave Germany for Haifa, where there’s an apartment waiting for her.
- 7/24/2015
- by David Edelstein
- Vulture
Christian Petzold (Ghosts, Barbara), perhaps one of the most gifted storytellers working in cinema today, strikes gold again with Phoenix, a Hitchcockian, postwar noir revenge flick. Clocking in at a very lean 98 minutes, the film revolves around a concentration camp survivor named Nelly, beautifully played by Petzold's muse Nina Hoss in her sixth collaboration with the director. Nelly returns to Berlin, now occupied by American GIs, with the aid of Lene (Nina Kunzendorf), a case worker for the newly established Jewish State, who keeps urging Nelly to leave Germany, go to Palestine, and start anew as soon as her bandages come off. Badly disfigured by a gunshot wound in the camp, Nelly is told by doctors to choose any face for reconstruction or 'recreation' - perhaps a face...
[Read the whole post on twitchfilm.com...]...
[Read the whole post on twitchfilm.com...]...
- 7/24/2015
- Screen Anarchy
There it calls to her, a burning red beacon of life in the wasteland that was once Berlin. It’s a nightclub, but, as its name suggests, perhaps quite a lot more. Nelly (Nina Hoss) hopes her husband is working within; perhaps she hopes he’s not. Her close friend has already warned her to avoid him, but she’s been through too much trauma to extinguish her faith in the familiar. Left for dead at a concentration camp, her face was scarred beyond recognition. Her reconstructive surgery was not wholly successful; glancing her appearance in a broken mirror, she withdraws in shock. So much of the film hinges on how Hoss reacts, or doesn’t react, and this reflected glance sets up the stakes of the film – who is she now, and does her past have any bearing on her future?
These immediate postwar years, historically, centered around grief and rebuilding.
These immediate postwar years, historically, centered around grief and rebuilding.
- 7/23/2015
- by Scott Nye
- CriterionCast
Phoenix Sundance Selects Reviewed by: Harvey Karten for Shockya. Databased on Rotten Tomatoes. Grade: A- Director: Christian Petzold Screenwriter: Christian Petzold, Harun Farocki, Hubert Monteilhet, adapted from Hubert Monteilhet’s “Return From the Ashes” Cast: Nina Hoss, Nina Kunzendorf, Ronald Zehrfeld, Trystan Putter, Michael Maertens, Imogen Kogge, Felix Romer Screened at: Review 1, NYC, 6/25/15 Opens: July 24, 2015 Just when you thought that all Holocaust-themed movies had been exhausted, along comes “Phoenix” which, actually, is not a brand new take on its repercussions. Hubert Monteilhet’s novel “Return from the Ashes” covers the material, adapted by Harun Farocki, and the novel had been filmed by J. Lee Thompson starring Maximilan Schell [ Read More ]
The post Phoenix Movie Review appeared first on Shockya.com.
The post Phoenix Movie Review appeared first on Shockya.com.
- 7/20/2015
- by Harvey Karten
- ShockYa
"Quit playing Nelly! I know you're not her!" Sundance Selects + IFC Films have debuted a Us trailer for the new film from German filmmaker Christian Petzold, titled Phoenix, a post-wwii-set Hitchcockian mystery about a woman who survives a concentration camp with a disfigured face. She attempts to find her husband and figure out if he betrayed her, while pretending to be a different person all along. Acclaimed German actress Nina Hoss stars, along with Ronald Zehrfeld and Nina Kunzendorf. The film premiered at the Toronto Film Festival last year, and the trailer includes some very positive quotes in praise of the complex narrative. If you're into mysteries or thrillers involving false identities and scorned partners, this is for you. Here's the official Us trailer for Christian Petzold's Phoenix, (embedded) in high def from Apple: As an alternative, here's the original international trailer for Phoenix initially released last year: Nelly (Hoss), a German-Jewish nightclub singer,...
- 6/26/2015
- by Alex Billington
- firstshowing.net
Sebastian Schipper’s Victoria was the big winner at this year’s German Film Awards, taking home six statuettes from its seven nominations including the Golden Lolas for Best Film, Best Director, and Best Lead Actor.
Schipper’s one-shot thriller set during a breathless night on the streets of Berlin also picked up Lolas for the Spanish actress Laia Costa, the title character, and the Danish cinematographer Sturla Brandth Grøvlen.
Victoria premiered in the Berlinale’s main competition last February where Grøvlen received a Silver Bear, was released in German cinemas on 11 June and is being handled internationally by The Match Factory.
The Silver Lola for Best Film was awarded by the members of the German Film Academy to Edward Berger’s social-realist drama Jack, with the Bronze Lola going to Johannes Naber’s black comedy Age Of Cannibals which deservedly also received the Lola for Best Screenplay for the searing dialogues by the author Stefan Weigl.
Both...
Schipper’s one-shot thriller set during a breathless night on the streets of Berlin also picked up Lolas for the Spanish actress Laia Costa, the title character, and the Danish cinematographer Sturla Brandth Grøvlen.
Victoria premiered in the Berlinale’s main competition last February where Grøvlen received a Silver Bear, was released in German cinemas on 11 June and is being handled internationally by The Match Factory.
The Silver Lola for Best Film was awarded by the members of the German Film Academy to Edward Berger’s social-realist drama Jack, with the Bronze Lola going to Johannes Naber’s black comedy Age Of Cannibals which deservedly also received the Lola for Best Screenplay for the searing dialogues by the author Stefan Weigl.
Both...
- 6/22/2015
- by screen.berlin@googlemail.com (Martin Blaney)
- ScreenDaily
Neil Armfield.s Holding the Man, Simon Stone.s The Daughter, Jeremy Sims. Last Cab to Darwin and Jen Peedom.s feature doc Sherpa will have their world premieres at the Sydney Film Festival.
The festival program unveiled today includes 33 world premieres (including 22 shorts) and 135 Australian premieres (with 18 shorts) among 251 titles from 68 countries.
Among the other premieres will be Daina Reid.s The Secret River, Ruby Entertainment's. ABC-tv miniseries starring Oliver Jackson Cohen and Sarah Snook, and three Oz docs, Marc Eberle.s The Cambodian Space Project — Not Easy Rock .n. Roll, Steve Thomas. Freedom Stories and Lisa Nicol.s Wide Open Sky.
Festival director Nashen Moodley boasted. this year.s event will be far larger than 2014's when 183 films from 47 countries were screened, including 15 world premieres. The expansion is possible in part due to the addition of two new screening venues in Newtown and Liverpool.
As previously announced, Brendan Cowell...
The festival program unveiled today includes 33 world premieres (including 22 shorts) and 135 Australian premieres (with 18 shorts) among 251 titles from 68 countries.
Among the other premieres will be Daina Reid.s The Secret River, Ruby Entertainment's. ABC-tv miniseries starring Oliver Jackson Cohen and Sarah Snook, and three Oz docs, Marc Eberle.s The Cambodian Space Project — Not Easy Rock .n. Roll, Steve Thomas. Freedom Stories and Lisa Nicol.s Wide Open Sky.
Festival director Nashen Moodley boasted. this year.s event will be far larger than 2014's when 183 films from 47 countries were screened, including 15 world premieres. The expansion is possible in part due to the addition of two new screening venues in Newtown and Liverpool.
As previously announced, Brendan Cowell...
- 5/6/2015
- by Don Groves
- IF.com.au
Christian Petzold (Ghosts, Barbara), perhaps one of the most gifted storytellers working in cinema today, strikes gold again with Phoenix, a Hitchcockian, postwar noir revenge flick. Clocking in at a very lean 98 minutes, the film revolves around a concentration camp survivor named Nelly, beautifully played by Petzold's muse Nina Hoss in her sixth collaboration with the director. Nelly returns to Berlin, now occupied by American GIs, with the aid of Lene (Nina Kunzendorf), a case worker for the newly established Jewish State, who keeps urging Nelly to leave Germany, go to Palestine, and start anew as soon as her bandages come off. Badly disfigured by a gunshot wound in the camp, Nelly is told by doctors to choose any face for reconstruction or 'recreation' - perhaps a face...
[Read the whole post on twitchfilm.com...]...
[Read the whole post on twitchfilm.com...]...
- 3/2/2015
- Screen Anarchy
Christian Petzold took a bold step into history with 2012's Barbara, exiling Nina Hoss's heroine into the diaphanous threats and suspicions of a provincial, 1980s East Germany. With Phoenix, his follow-up, Petzold takes this movement into history even further, striking starkly, deeply at questions of identity in a post-war Germany quivering silently with destitution, rage, and willful blindness. In a spectral sequence opening the film directly evoking the eerie clinical imagery of Georges Franju's lyrical horror film Eyes without a Face, Nelly, a concentration camp survivor, returns in quiet to Berlin after having reconstructive surgery following wartime mutilations. The woman who emerges from under the knife cannot be recognized. She emerges as embodied by Nina Hoss—a true queen in today's cinema—and her slender, lean physique becomes that of a post-war zombie, a ghost embodied, tottering and halting, a body not familiar with movements outside the camp,...
- 2/26/2015
- by Daniel Kasman
- MUBI
Name and focus changes for every section, which are now all competitive, resulting in the festival’s structure being “slimmer’.
The ninth Rome Film Festival (Oct 16-25) has revealed a diverse line-up including the Italian premieres for potential awards contenders including David Fincher’s Gone Girl. the world premiere of Takashi Miike’s As the Gods Will and Burhan Qurbani’s We are Young, We are Strong and European premiere of Oren Moverman’s Time Out of Mind, Toronto hit Still Alice and Kahlil Gibran’s The Prophet.
This year for the first time the award-winners in each section of the programme will be decided by the audience on the basis of votes cast after the screenings.
Each section has changed name and focus for 2014 and are all competitive, resulting in the festival’s structure being “slimmer’.
Italian comedies Soap Opera and Andiamo a Quel Paese bookend the line-up.
Full line-up
Cinema D’Oggi
World premiere
• Angely...
The ninth Rome Film Festival (Oct 16-25) has revealed a diverse line-up including the Italian premieres for potential awards contenders including David Fincher’s Gone Girl. the world premiere of Takashi Miike’s As the Gods Will and Burhan Qurbani’s We are Young, We are Strong and European premiere of Oren Moverman’s Time Out of Mind, Toronto hit Still Alice and Kahlil Gibran’s The Prophet.
This year for the first time the award-winners in each section of the programme will be decided by the audience on the basis of votes cast after the screenings.
Each section has changed name and focus for 2014 and are all competitive, resulting in the festival’s structure being “slimmer’.
Italian comedies Soap Opera and Andiamo a Quel Paese bookend the line-up.
Full line-up
Cinema D’Oggi
World premiere
• Angely...
- 9/29/2014
- by andreas.wiseman@screendaily.com (Andreas Wiseman)
- ScreenDaily
Dear Fern,
For a final postscript I don't have so much a correspondence or a round-up of what I've seen for you, but rather I've saved the best for last: Christian Petzold's Phoenix.
Christian Petzold took a bold step into history with 2012's Barbara, exiling Nina Hoss's heroine into the diaphanous threats and suspicions of a provincial, 1980s East Germany. With Phoenix, his follow-up, Petzold takes this movement into history even further, striking starkly, deeply at questions of identity in a post-war Germany quivering silently with destitution, rage, and willful blindness. In a spectral sequence opening the film directly evoking the eerie clinical imagery of Georges Franju's lyrical horror film Eyes without a Face, Nelly, a concentration camp survivor, returns in quiet to Berlin after having reconstructive surgery following wartime mutilations. The woman who emerges from under the knife cannot be recognized. She emerges as embodied by...
For a final postscript I don't have so much a correspondence or a round-up of what I've seen for you, but rather I've saved the best for last: Christian Petzold's Phoenix.
Christian Petzold took a bold step into history with 2012's Barbara, exiling Nina Hoss's heroine into the diaphanous threats and suspicions of a provincial, 1980s East Germany. With Phoenix, his follow-up, Petzold takes this movement into history even further, striking starkly, deeply at questions of identity in a post-war Germany quivering silently with destitution, rage, and willful blindness. In a spectral sequence opening the film directly evoking the eerie clinical imagery of Georges Franju's lyrical horror film Eyes without a Face, Nelly, a concentration camp survivor, returns in quiet to Berlin after having reconstructive surgery following wartime mutilations. The woman who emerges from under the knife cannot be recognized. She emerges as embodied by...
- 9/16/2014
- by Daniel Kasman
- MUBI
Accompanied by a bass line and piano score of single malt-smoothness, the opening scene of Phoenix lets the viewer add a framing device to the film, should they so choose. There’s no narrative trickery or chronological playfulness to the film, but from its music alone, Phoenix is inviting you to listen to a Holocaust story told as lounge room anecdote. It’s a jazzy mishmash of a tale: part jukebox noire, part psychological drama. The fusion is uneven to start, but the longer its themes commingle, the more Phoenix harmonizes into something unforgettable.
Nina Hoss stars as Nelly Lenz, an Auschwitz prisoner returning to Ally-occupied Berlin shortly after the war’s conclusion. The sole survivor of her family, Nina stands to inherit a sizeable fortune, part of which is spent reconstructing her face, which was badly disfigured during her internment. Looking not entirely like herself, Nina makes contact in...
Nina Hoss stars as Nelly Lenz, an Auschwitz prisoner returning to Ally-occupied Berlin shortly after the war’s conclusion. The sole survivor of her family, Nina stands to inherit a sizeable fortune, part of which is spent reconstructing her face, which was badly disfigured during her internment. Looking not entirely like herself, Nina makes contact in...
- 9/13/2014
- by Sam Woolf
- We Got This Covered
"You look very similar to someone." If you're interested in mysterious German suspense dramas, then you won't want to miss this one. Phoenix is the latest film from German filmmaker Christian Petzold, and it just premiered at the Toronto Film Festival this week. To compliment its festival unveiling, the production has released the first trailer. The film stars Nina Hoss (A Woman in Berlin, Barbara, A Most Wanted Man) as a concentration camp survivor who ends up searching through postwar Berlin to find the man she believes betrayed her to the Nazis. The cast includes Ronald Zehrfeld and Nina Kunzendorf. I can't say this looks like something everyone will enjoy, but there's certainly an intriguing element to it. Take a look. Here's the first official trailer for Christian Petzold's Phoenix, posted on Vimeo (found via SlashFilm): Plot from the Tiff guide: "A concentration-camp survivor (Nina Hoss) searches ravaged...
- 9/11/2014
- by Alex Billington
- firstshowing.net
Survival tales set during the Second World War and around the Nazi era, have been the social environment of many a film. The horrors of the Holocaust and the madness of an ideology shattered an entire nation’s culture, and damaged it to the point of necessary re-creation. As far as movies go, it’s a milieu that will never get old, but one that can feel stale with a certain, typical, style of direction. On the other hand, when you have a filmmaker with a deep understanding of what makes films breathe and an uncanny capability for absolute control, a familiar canvass can be an advantage. This is precisely what it is for German auteur Christian Petzold and his extravagant, eloquent and deeply effective film “Phoenix.” The story is set in post-war Berlin, ravaged by war and still very much lurking in the shadows of distorted principles, where Jewish...
- 9/10/2014
- by Nikola Grozdanovic
- The Playlist
Christian Petzold's Phoenix, set in Berlin in the immediate aftermath of World War II and starring Nina Hoss, Ronald Zehrfeld and Nina Kunzendorf, sees its official world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival in a few weeks. But Petzold's followup to Barbara (2012) will also be opening in Germany on September 25 and the first reviews have begun to appear online. They are, overall, quite positive, and I thought I'd translate a few passages. » - David Hudson...
- 8/10/2014
- Fandor: Keyframe
Christian Petzold's Phoenix, set in Berlin in the immediate aftermath of World War II and starring Nina Hoss, Ronald Zehrfeld and Nina Kunzendorf, sees its official world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival in a few weeks. But Petzold's followup to Barbara (2012) will also be opening in Germany on September 25 and the first reviews have begun to appear online. They are, overall, quite positive, and I thought I'd translate a few passages. » - David Hudson...
- 8/10/2014
- Keyframe
Phoenix
Director: Christian Petzold
Writer: Christian Petzold
Producers: Schramm Film Koerner & Weber
U.S. Distributor: Rights Available
Cast: Nina Hoss, Ronald Zehrfeld, Nina Kunzendorf, Uwe Preuss
One of the best films of 2012 happened to be Christian Petzold’s film Barbara starring the exquisite Nina Hoss. Petzold has been steadily churning out remarkable work in feature films since his 2000 debut The State I Am In (and for several years prior in television). While Hoss has headlined a few of his works (Yella, Jerichow ), the Berlin premiered Barbara finally seemed to command the attention he’s deserved (he won the Director Silver Bear), and he’s back again with Hoss in tow for another period piece, Phoenix (which also reunites him with Ronald Zehrfeld).
Gist: While Barbara was set in the German Democratic Republic of the early 1980s, Phoenix goes back to the post-Second World War era, focusing on a woman who has survived the Holocaust.
Director: Christian Petzold
Writer: Christian Petzold
Producers: Schramm Film Koerner & Weber
U.S. Distributor: Rights Available
Cast: Nina Hoss, Ronald Zehrfeld, Nina Kunzendorf, Uwe Preuss
One of the best films of 2012 happened to be Christian Petzold’s film Barbara starring the exquisite Nina Hoss. Petzold has been steadily churning out remarkable work in feature films since his 2000 debut The State I Am In (and for several years prior in television). While Hoss has headlined a few of his works (Yella, Jerichow ), the Berlin premiered Barbara finally seemed to command the attention he’s deserved (he won the Director Silver Bear), and he’s back again with Hoss in tow for another period piece, Phoenix (which also reunites him with Ronald Zehrfeld).
Gist: While Barbara was set in the German Democratic Republic of the early 1980s, Phoenix goes back to the post-Second World War era, focusing on a woman who has survived the Holocaust.
- 3/7/2014
- by Nicholas Bell
- IONCINEMA.com
Rotterdam this year has offered one certifiable giant discovery in international cinema: German filmmaker Dominik Graf, revealed in a simultaneously introductory and interventionist retrospective programmed by Christoph Huber and Olaf Möller. An incredibly prolific filmmaker beginning in the late 1970s, Graf has interwoven his cinema into the fabric of the German television industry, producing a body of work ranging from television episodes, made-for-tv films, essay movies, documentaries, and a handful of films intended for the cinema.
Yet despite Graf's prodigious output of nearly sixty works, its primarily creation for national television has meant that it has been essentially unavailable to English-speaking audiences prior to Rotterdam's 17 film retrospective. The first film of his I saw was Komm mir nicht nach (Don't Follow Me Around) in the middle of the Dreileben trilogy in 2010, notably another for-television project, but one which had festival and theatrical ambitions beyond German living rooms, perhaps due...
Yet despite Graf's prodigious output of nearly sixty works, its primarily creation for national television has meant that it has been essentially unavailable to English-speaking audiences prior to Rotterdam's 17 film retrospective. The first film of his I saw was Komm mir nicht nach (Don't Follow Me Around) in the middle of the Dreileben trilogy in 2010, notably another for-television project, but one which had festival and theatrical ambitions beyond German living rooms, perhaps due...
- 2/6/2013
- by Daniel Kasman
- MUBI
'Passages'
NEW YORK -- From the second scene of "Passages", where a disabled teenage boy rolls a cigarette with his feet, we realize our conceptions are about to be changed.
Powerful and haunting, "Passages" is the semi-factual account of a group of remarkably self-sufficient disabled teenagers, living their surrealistic lives in the confined universe of a hospital.
Writer-director Yilmaz Arslan makes his electrifying American debut at this year's New Directors/
New Films Series, with the showing of this film today and Wednesday at the Museum of Modern Art. Whether his semi-autobiographical film is an exorcism or a rite of passage, it is truly an unforgettable experience.
Though "Passages" will never find its way to a mainstream audience, this difficult but compelling film is important in many ways, and deserves a much wider audience than it seems destined to receive. Perhaps a brave public television program director will find a way to air it.
Simultaneously eliminating and highlighting the barriers placed around disabled people, Arslan allows us to view this extraordinary group as, well, ordinary. That's quite an achievement. By film's end we don't see them as limited, we see instead the limits placed on them by society.
In the opening scene we are shown the hospital director giving a tour of the facility to some prospective parents. After that, we see no supervisory people for the rest of the film, except to pass out some discipline, and at the end when the same director is giving another tour.
There's almost a "King of Hearts" quality to this hospital, where it seems the inmates are running the place. And the fact that as the film progresses we are focusing on these teens as individuals, rather than focusing on their handicaps, is a credit both to Arslan and to his "real" cast.
There is darkness everywhere in this hospital, including within the hearts and minds of some of its inhabitants. But at the same time, there are some who enjoy their lives to the fullest, which in many aspects is full indeed. There is romance, sex, alcohol, drugs, hockey, fights, sarcasm and alienation. Just like in the outside world. The only difference is that they are stuck in this world.
Of course, there are some images that break our hearts and get our compassion juices flowing, but this film is not about pity, it's about survival. There's no plot, as such. We simply meet all sorts of people and follow their various relationships with great interest, and some trepidation.
Ralph Graf's moody jazz score conveys just the right tone for this environment, and Arslan's camera takes us deep inside his vision.
"Passages" may not be an uplifting film, but it takes us to a higher level of understanding. It also introduces us to an impressive filmmaker.
PASSAGES
O-Film
Director, writer Yilmaz Arslan
Photographer Izzet Akay
Editor Bettina Bohler
Music Ralph Graf
Color
In German with subtitles
Cast: Nina Kunzendorf, Dieter Resch, Martin Seeger, Marco Neumeier, Tarik Senouci, Alexandra Krieger, Juana Volkers, Agnes Steinacker, Hermine Mischon, Andreas Frank, Christian Verhoeven.
Running time - 80 minutes
No MPAA Rating
(c) The Hollywood Reporter...
Powerful and haunting, "Passages" is the semi-factual account of a group of remarkably self-sufficient disabled teenagers, living their surrealistic lives in the confined universe of a hospital.
Writer-director Yilmaz Arslan makes his electrifying American debut at this year's New Directors/
New Films Series, with the showing of this film today and Wednesday at the Museum of Modern Art. Whether his semi-autobiographical film is an exorcism or a rite of passage, it is truly an unforgettable experience.
Though "Passages" will never find its way to a mainstream audience, this difficult but compelling film is important in many ways, and deserves a much wider audience than it seems destined to receive. Perhaps a brave public television program director will find a way to air it.
Simultaneously eliminating and highlighting the barriers placed around disabled people, Arslan allows us to view this extraordinary group as, well, ordinary. That's quite an achievement. By film's end we don't see them as limited, we see instead the limits placed on them by society.
In the opening scene we are shown the hospital director giving a tour of the facility to some prospective parents. After that, we see no supervisory people for the rest of the film, except to pass out some discipline, and at the end when the same director is giving another tour.
There's almost a "King of Hearts" quality to this hospital, where it seems the inmates are running the place. And the fact that as the film progresses we are focusing on these teens as individuals, rather than focusing on their handicaps, is a credit both to Arslan and to his "real" cast.
There is darkness everywhere in this hospital, including within the hearts and minds of some of its inhabitants. But at the same time, there are some who enjoy their lives to the fullest, which in many aspects is full indeed. There is romance, sex, alcohol, drugs, hockey, fights, sarcasm and alienation. Just like in the outside world. The only difference is that they are stuck in this world.
Of course, there are some images that break our hearts and get our compassion juices flowing, but this film is not about pity, it's about survival. There's no plot, as such. We simply meet all sorts of people and follow their various relationships with great interest, and some trepidation.
Ralph Graf's moody jazz score conveys just the right tone for this environment, and Arslan's camera takes us deep inside his vision.
"Passages" may not be an uplifting film, but it takes us to a higher level of understanding. It also introduces us to an impressive filmmaker.
PASSAGES
O-Film
Director, writer Yilmaz Arslan
Photographer Izzet Akay
Editor Bettina Bohler
Music Ralph Graf
Color
In German with subtitles
Cast: Nina Kunzendorf, Dieter Resch, Martin Seeger, Marco Neumeier, Tarik Senouci, Alexandra Krieger, Juana Volkers, Agnes Steinacker, Hermine Mischon, Andreas Frank, Christian Verhoeven.
Running time - 80 minutes
No MPAA Rating
(c) The Hollywood Reporter...
- 3/23/1993
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
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