Not all films by, about or with women are “female films,” this one truly is emancipatory and would score high on the Bechdel test, as in: women talking to each other about something other than men. Actually, no-one in this film is talking about men. "Talking about the Weather" is in fact rather Talking about Women.
Clara, 39, is doing a PhD in philosophy in Berlin and teaching at the university.
When she visits the East German provincial village she grew up in to attend her (working-class) mother's birthday party, she realizes how far she has moved away from her roots in search of her own life and purpose. The “having it all but not feeling it” conundrum of academic ambition, working life, colleagues, boss, friends, exes, children, lovers, family, community reveals itself bit by bit, nearly accidentally or perhaps unavoidably.
"It's about home and origin and what you have to leave behind for a self-determined life, especially as a woman,” is how director Annika Pinske frames her debut film, putting gender questions in a wider social and personal development context.
The attempt to distance herself from her social background leads Clara into crisis. Fittingly, she is working on Hegel’s idea of freedom vis-a-vis family and the bourgeoisie. Clara is detached, without footing, floating through her own life like an observer rather than an actor (while having lots to say about others’ lives). Actress Anne Schäfer, who you might remember from "When Hitler Stole Pink Rabbit” but who is so far mostly known for her TV roles, embodies Clara with quiet prickliness, moving obstinately and longingly through the film and Clara’s life. We are as puzzled and mesmerized as the student Clara has a hotel room fling with: "I don’t know how you do it -- one minute you're like this, the next you’re totally different."
"Talking about the Weather" is about female bonds, the good and the bad, the solidarity and the envy, the support and frustration. The film is at its best when women come together and connect, which is most of the time, like in the university hallway where Clara introduces her rough-around-the-edges (would we perceive a man like that?) boss Margot to affronted guest lecturer Hanna, played by Sandra Hüller, leaving an impression in all of her three minutes. Sentences like "You are a bad person” land in the middle of these social encounters.
Half way through the film we leave Berlin. "Is that what you think I want to hear or what you really want?” Clara, standing in the village supermarket, challenges her mother (and really herself) to dig deeper, to question, to demand more. As Clara again reprimands her mother, her own teenage daughter walks in, reminding her of their tenuous relationship. Everyone in the film is a “bad" and “good” person, all of Clara’s questions get thrown back at her. What Clara wants is to not just talk about the weather, or traffic, but to communicate, connect, find comfort in others, regain a sense of home: “When I manage to grasp a thought, write it down and someone reads it and understands it like I do…,” Clara tries to explain her academic pursuits to her childhood boyfriend.
Pinske expertly weaves the big and delicate life questions viewers, whatever gender, will relate to and masters a subtle range of tonality. The film’s delayed gratification approach is exactly that: gratifying, in its reprise of nuances (talking about traffic), its character juxtapositions (we aren't alone with our worries) and the loving, judgment-free attention to round characters breezily staged by an excellent ensemble cast. The philosophical setting gives Pinske a launchpad for some stiff (male) academic dinner table discourse at the beginning, but even that, initially jarring, comes into perspective later when we witness a not so different (male) village party talk.
Men, while well portrayed, appear as rather incidental extras without introduction or explanation. They are simply around or not, as lovers, friends, students, the patriarchy, including Ronald Zehrfeld ("Phoenix;" "Barbara") as the father of Clara’s daughter and Max Riemelt ("Free Fall") as former hometown love.
Time-delayed wounds, intergenerational ruptures, the personal pursuit of happiness intermingle as a flock of birds --"damn thieves," granddad comments-- flies by (see Hegel and freedom). Attractively unwieldy characters, who admittedly demand some patience from the viewer, a smart script, seductively moody camera-work, and poignant music choices all add up to an accomplished
Bildungsroman of a film, with some Toni Erdmann-esque humour strewn in, like a gender role conversation about “the husband behind" Angela Merkel.
Having grown up in Frankfurt (Oder) in east Germany, filmmaker Pinske worked for acclaimed Berlin theatre director René Pollesch while studying philosophy and literature. She was assistant to filmmaker Maren Ade for "Toni Erdmann" as well as on the hit TV series "Unorthodox." In 2011, she began a directing degree at the German Film and Television Academy Berlin.
"Talking about the Weather" is her graduation film and a captivating and promising feature film debut. I cannot wait for what comes next for and from Annika Pinske.
Back at the university in Berlin, Clara wraps it up nicely in a mock lecture about German philosopher Michael Theunissen, conspicuously to an empty classroom, talking to herself: How to enable an intersubjective conceptualization of freedom? What might an intersubjective dynamic of the social look like? How could this be identified as a dynamic that enables freedom in a positive sense?
Clara‘s mentor Margot responds: "First, you have to forgive yourself for wanting more from life."
by
@JuttaBrendemuhl
image c Ben Bernhard / DFFB
