Marion Mitterhammer Movies
A family's crises come to the surface in this drama, the first feature from filmmaker Matthias Luthardt. Stefan (Falk Rockstroh) and Anna (Marion Mitterhammer) are a petit bourgeois couple who live a comfortable if bland existence in the suburbs with their nebbishy son Robert (Clemens Berg), who they all but ignore. One day Stefan and Anna's teenage nephew Paul (Sebastian Urzendowsky) arrives at their home without warning and announces he's moving in; since Paul's father recently committed suicide, his aunt and uncle are not inclined to argue with him, and he begins earning his keep by fixing up the family's swimming pool, which they haven't used in years. Paul makes a token effort at bonding with Robert, but beyond playing ping pong they don't seem to have any common interests, though it doesn't take Anna long to realize that her nephew is sexually attracted to her. When Stefan is called away on business, Paul attempts to seduce Anna, though she seems to regard his efforts as quaint rather than arousing. Eventually, Paul can no longer deal with the tensions of the household, leading to an emotional explosion. Pingpong received its premiere at the 2006 Cannes Film Festival. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Sebastian Urzendowsky, Marion Mitterhammer, (more)
Raúl Ruiz's Klimt uses an amorphous, nonchronological narrative to cinematize events from the life of one of the 20th century's most profound artists: the Austrian painter Gustav Klimt (here portrayed by John Malkovich). Ruiz begins with Klimt's painful death from syphilis, and spends the remainder of the film transitioning, loosely and freely, between episodes that befell the painter. The film pays particularly strong attention to the artist's proclivity for scandalizing the European upper crust with overtly erotic subject matter and presentation, and his many affairs -- notably a lengthy one with his perpetual inspiration, Lea de Castro (Saffron Burrows). Throughout Klimt's life, a figure known as the Secretary (Stephen Dillane) comes and goes, who is actually a product of his fevered imagination -- and with whom the painter debates continually about the function of art in contemporary Western civilization, and the relevance of the artist. This enables Ruiz to create both a biographical sketch and a philosophical treatise. Visually, Ruiz and director of photography Ricardo Aronovich make the ambitious decision to recreate Klimt's style of painting on a cinematographic plane.
Unfortunately, difficulty befell this picture from the beginning, when the director (for some unascertainable reason) opted to draft the initial script in French, have it translated into German, and then have the German draft translated into English and revised by author Gilbert Adair -- rendering the dialogue stilted and unconvincing. Complications also arose on the distribution end. Still infuriated by the distributive mutilation that befell his previous film, the whopping Time Regained (and doubtless concerned that this might happen again), Ruiz pliantly struck a bargain with distributors for Klimt. He trimmed his original, 135-minute "director's cut" down to a 96-minute "producer's cut" for general consumption, which rendered much of the material less fluid and coherent. Both versions screened at the 2006 Rotterdam Film Festival. ~ Nathan Southern, All Movie Guide
Unfortunately, difficulty befell this picture from the beginning, when the director (for some unascertainable reason) opted to draft the initial script in French, have it translated into German, and then have the German draft translated into English and revised by author Gilbert Adair -- rendering the dialogue stilted and unconvincing. Complications also arose on the distribution end. Still infuriated by the distributive mutilation that befell his previous film, the whopping Time Regained (and doubtless concerned that this might happen again), Ruiz pliantly struck a bargain with distributors for Klimt. He trimmed his original, 135-minute "director's cut" down to a 96-minute "producer's cut" for general consumption, which rendered much of the material less fluid and coherent. Both versions screened at the 2006 Rotterdam Film Festival. ~ Nathan Southern, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- John Malkovich, Veronica Ferres, (more)
The seemingly random interactions between a group of people touched by a tragedy go under the microscope in this drama from Austrian filmmaker Barbara Albert. Manu (Kathrin Resetarits) is a woman who miraculously survives an airline crash caused by a freak storm that claims the life of every other passenger on board. Six years later, she's happily married to Andreas (Georg Friedrich), has a teenaged daughter named Yvonne (Deborah Ten Brink), and works at a supermarket -- only to die suddenly in an auto accident. Among the mourners at Manu's funeral are her brother Reini (Martin Brambach) and sister Gerlinde (Marion Mitterhammer). Schoolteacher Reini is infatuated with a troubled woman named Sandra (Bellinda Akwa-Asare), and is trying to reach out to one of his students, Kai (Dominik Hartel), who is haunted by the death of his mother. Andreas becomes involved with another teacher, Andrea (Ursula Strauss), who also has an unhappy student, Patricia (Désirée Ourada), an outcast with an interest in spirituality. Patricia strikes up a friendship with Kai as he drifts away from his girlfriend, Gabi (Nicole Skala). Meanwhile, Yvonne becomes ill and ponders her mother's fate in the hereafter, and Gerlinde becomes involved in an emotionally destructive sexual relationship with a handicapped man. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Kathrin Resetarits, Ursula Strauss, (more)
- 2003
German director Pago Balke's Verrückt Nach Paris (Crazy About Paris) tells the tale of mentally and physically handicapped people, and employed performers who confront these same challenges in real life. Tired of poor care, typified by the behavior of Enno (Dominique Horwitz), Hilde (Paula Kleine), Philip (Frank Grabski), and Karl (Wolfgang Goettsch) escape from the institution where they reside. As they taste independence on the outside, Enno changes his behavior after falling in love. ~ Perry Seibert, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Wolfgang Goettsch, Frank Grabski, (more)
