Reviews

To begin with: this is a very good movie. This is at least how I felt while watching it. It will satisfy you in multiple ways because it works on multiple layer. The one the was most present to me is the critical abstraction from everyday life in an occupied region. In conceptual an visual dense shots it deals with interpersonal communication under constant pressure. Later on the view is opened to the political dimension of interchange between the two (or one and a half) states. At the same time you will get emotionally involved with several person and there very own way of individual reception of the situation that eventually will lead to resistance. Interwoven with this is a symbolic discourse sometimes philosophic sometimes mere ironic, forcing the audience to think, to make there mind up on what they are seeing. This all is refined with a dark, omnipresent but deeply human humour. For me it worked.

9 out of 10 and a strong recommendation to see it for all those who love cinema that keeps one thinking.

in fact there is not much to say about this film. simple story: father looses children to custody, fights against state and church to get them back and in the end succeeds. You got the usual subplots, like children vs. nuns, lawyer vs. judge etc. This mixed up with some laughs, some tears, some values and some prayers. Altogether well acted, well produced. Shallow but solid. I guess you can see a lot worse in cinema, but of course you also can see a lot better.

I just voted for this movie and heavy hearted had to give a 5, because as a movie it's not better than that. But despite other 5 point movie I don't feel cheated or disappointed by having seen it. This is because there are many good things about it. Small thing like single scenes, shots, dialogs, images, symbolism, a face expression here, a sound there. This movie has potential. It tries to weave a huge picture by single scenes and pictures. Unfortunately it fails completely. The worst thing about the film is it's script, which features a quite uninspired story, with some holes and implausibilities, in rather unconnected scenes and impression, which mostly not fit together. Adding to this you got to many directing mistakes or at least that's what I think they are. Because at times the movie really starts to take you in, let you care about on character or the other and the comes a pointless or unbelievable scene, a dispensable shot and you get set back on the road. There I have to say again, this movie has failed, but being the first movie of Katherine Lindberg, it makes you hope, that the future work of this director might be something to look forward to.

It has been said an awful lot about this movie. Therefore I'll just say this. If you ever believed you loved cinema, then you have to see this movie, because it's all what cinema ever longed to be. It's pure beauty in light and shadow, in music and silence, in motion and stand. It's pure emotion from love to alienation, from lightness to despair. One of the most stunning features of this movie is, that despite of it's exclusively slow intriguing shots (and even if some people state the opposite), the tempo in which the movie is telling it's story is extremely height. In between every two scenes normally lie hours, days, weeks. You get taken in instantly. Highly recommended for all cineastes and those who want to become.

"Berlin Is In Germany" take an close look on the former eastern German society 11 years after. This look is done through the eyes of the last "Ossi" who had spend these very years in prison and is now released to a country he only knows from television. But even this is a quite extreme setting, the movie makes no big deal of it. It tells every thing that's needed to tell and nothing more. It concentrates on details but constructs a subtle image of a whole society, a snapshot. Beside this, it's very well acted and made with love for it characters. Therefore it seems believable. All in all, I highly recommend this one to all, interested in the fact, that there still is more than one Germany, but also to all who just want to see a nice and human movie about the difficulties of finding ones way back into society.

highly enjoyable

first of all I have to say, that my music knowledge of the time period considered by the movie tends to zero. Most of the reviews came to the conclusion, that in this case it's impossible to enjoy this movie. Well, in fact I did. A lot of the shortcomings that are claimed, I have to agree on, especially concerning the script. But never the less this movie does something what only good movies do. It takes you to a different point of view. Right, I normally might don't care about a band like "Joy Division", but through the eyes of Tony Wilson I do. I was taken back to a different time, space and lifestyle, more or less to an other universe and I very much like it, though I have no idea if the thing experienced with the movie has anything to do with what it really was like. Beside this the movie is a fine piece of filmmaking and there fore just a pleasure to watch. Good acting, well done pseudo documentary style approach, loads of dry humor. Sometimes it gets a bit sentimental, but this you have to stand through, which is not this hard, because thankfully the film doesn't take it self to serious. This doesn't mean it would not be totally devoted to it's subject, but it just takes it with a twinkle in it's eye. The most important point of course is the music. Even being no fan of it and having no clue about the bands, the music alone is worth seeing this movie All in all it's of course not a masterpiece or a work of genius, but it's highly enjoyable for anyone who will allow to be take with to a place where (supposedly) history was made.

I just saw RFAD the second time, first time on the big screen and I still think it's and very good movie. Knowing what was expecting me made the emotional impact gave way for a more calm and rational view. When people seriously criticise the movie, they often say, that the characters are flat and artificial. And they are somehow right, but I personally think that this is not a flaw of the movie or script, but just an different attempt of telling a story. There are a lot of very good movies building up characters from the inside, showing fragile emotional and intellectual structures rising and falling. RFAD chooses a more "graphic" way. The characters are abstract images, looked at with a cold distance. They are not actual human beings but an essence of some of theirs ways, they are dreams of beings in a dreamlike graphic world. And as the title already tells they get shattered. People might be right in judging these attempt as inhuman and potentially superficial, but I feel otherwise. To me it is really beautiful and precious and the fact that such a highly abstract and stylised point of view can cause a real emotional effect shows the high quality of this picture.

It's a while since I saw the movie but I still remember a lot of images and the above all the feeling. I grew up in the eastern part of Berlin but life in Munich (in the former western part) now for most of my life. And this movie gave me a strange feeling of home. I guess it's the way people look, talk, dress, just behave and be with each other. This film for sure not is contemporary, it might even be old fashioned and nostalgic, but this not necessarily is bad. Beside this very personal and subjective view, I think it's a pretty good movie. It's about emotions, but with a cold distant. It's about the change of society, which has just begun and the characters do not know yet, if they will have a place there when it's over. It's about meaning and dreams. Actually the whole movie seems to be like a variation of the book "The Unbearable Lightness of Being", because it takes up lots of it's thoughts and images. And it's really beautiful to watch.

There is a lot to say about this movie, but I won't. Just this: go and see it. It's the one of the most intelligent and best made American movies I ever saw. Having seen it three times now, I have to agree with my friends who say, that there is not a single picture or gesture or sound or whatever which occurs accidental or without purpose. I think this movie planed to and level of obsession. It's beautiful. It's deep. It's great. GO AND SEE IT.

I've seen 29 Palms at the 'fantasy filmfest' and had quiet a good time watching it. It's a classical road movie some in middle of nowhere (29 Palms, to be exactly). There is a smart lawyer on the run, a killer, Indians, a corrupt cop, a f**ked up casino security guard, a pretty girl, a sheriff, quite a lot dessert and of course a bag full of money. The rest is not really new and lies somewhere between `U-Turn' and `Way of the Gun`. Not as cynic as the first and not as witty as the last, but very amusing. The story is told very good with lots of good timed flashbacks and the film is photographed nicely, with beautiful pictures and pleasant camera effects. 29 Palms is not hyper original, but it guarantees a entertaining, joyful evening in cinema. (8/10)

To make it short: This is still the best comedy I ever saw, reached maybe only by "Rushmore" and "The Royal Tenenbaums". Like all really good comedies it is not a comedy at all, but a heartbreaking tragedy hidden under the surface of a crooked world.