Angela Winkler

  • Thomas Arslan – Ferien aka Vacation (2007)

    Thomas Arslan2001-2010ArthouseDramaGermany
    Ferien (2007)
    Ferien (2007)

    Synopsis
    Ferien (Vacation, 2007) was perhaps the festival’s best German feature. Thomas Arslan’s latest outlines the strained composition of a family and the disintegration of a marriage, set in a luminous Brandenburg summer. The film is confined: the story takes place almost exclusively on the grounds of the mother’s country house and the cinematic language speaks only static shots and long takes. Just at the very end of the film does one see the whole family together. Arslan’s feat reveals the shifting constellations of family members in individual conversations and encounters: the grandmother is tender and wise while alone with granddaughter Laura, cold when Laura’s sister Sophie enters, and bitchy in scenes with her daughter Anna. Read More »

  • Claude Goretta – La provinciale AKA The Girl From Lorraine (1981)

    Claude Goretta1981-1990ArthouseDramaFrance

    Draughtswoman Nathalie Baye moves to Paris. This is the tale of her sad encounters and experiences, and the dignity she retains.
    Aside from the subdued and true-to-life quality that Claude Goretta’s movies share – in my opinion – with his fellow Swiss Alain Tanner, this is a deeply emotional and depressing film. Nathalie Baye is – as usual – incredibly beautiful, moving and convincing.Read More »

  • Paulus Manker – Der Kopf des Mohren AKA The Moor’s Head (1995)

    1991-2000ArthouseAustriaDramaPaulus Manker

    Quote:
    A family man slowly becomes dangerously obsessive and paranoid in this grim Austrian drama that contains a graphically violent ending. As the story begins, George, an engineer who works at a science facility, has a normal happy life with his wife and kids. They are in the process of building a new house when George learns that a nearby chemical plant has been leaking dangerous gas into the air. This causes George to begin suffering from terrifying hallucinations. His paranoia increases every time he hears another report of violence, crime, war, or any other social problems on the news. After learning that his company may be overtaken by a larger corporation, George decides to send his family on an Italian vacation while he stays home and turns their apartment into a strange refuge from the terrible world he knows is coming.Read More »

  • Peter Fleischmann – Jagdszenen aus Niederbayern AKA Hunting Scenes from Bavaria (1969)

    1961-1970ArthouseDramaGermanyPeter FleischmannQueer Cinema(s)

    Quote:
    Of all the new crop of films by new German directors, this first film by Peter Fleischmann has attracted the most attention, and is based upon a prizewinning play by 25-year-old Martin Sperr. Hunting Scenes from Bavaria is a contemporary political play, which, in its broadest viewpoint, is an examination of the social order and its morals. It is set in Lower Bavaria, not because that particular locale is the source of the actions taking place in the film, but because the overall pattern of behavior in German village life was the best way to illustrate a certain sociological process: the hunting or persecution of human beings who, because of certain peculiarities, are living outside of the social order.Read More »

  • Volker Schlöndorff – Die Blechtrommel AKA The Tin Drum [Director’s Cut] (1979)

    1971-1980DramaGermanyVolker SchlöndorffWar

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    Quote:
    “A country unable to mourn,” Volker Schlöndorff wrote in his journal as he adapted Günter Grass’ novel, The Tin Drum. “Germany, to this day, is the poisoned heart of Europe.” When the film premiered in West German cinemas in early May 1979, it figured within a country’s larger (and, in many minds, long overdue) reckoning with a legacy of shame and violence. Indeed, the Nazi past haunted the nation’s screens, more so than it ever had since the end of World War II. The American miniseries Holocaust aired that year on public television in February and catalyzed wide discussion about Germany’s responsibility for the Shoah. Later that month, Peter Lilienthal’s David gained accolades at the Berlin Film Festival for its stirring depiction of a young Jewish boy living underground in the Reich’s capital during the deportations to the camps. History returned as film; retrospective readings of the Third Reich by Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Alexander Kluge, Edgar Reitz, Helma Sanders-Brahms, and Hans-Jürgen Syberberg (among others) would become the calling card of the New German Cinema and bring this group of critical filmmakers an extraordinary international renown. In 1979, The Tin Drum won the Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival. A year later, it would become the first feature from the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG) to receive an Oscar for best foreign film.Read More »

  • Margarethe von Trotta – Heller Wahn AKA Sheer Madness (1983)

    1981-1990ArthouseClassicsGermanyMargarethe von Trotta

    29f7c043f76a2bde437fd0d52a185152

    Olga and Ruth become friends. Olga is independent, separated from her husband, living with an immigrant pianist… Read More »

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