The theme for this year’s array of #German films at #TIFF14 could have been
Hot Young Actors, and they all came, to the delight of fans: Tom Schilling, Elyas M'Barek, Hannah Herzsprung, Alexander Fehling, Florian David Fitz. The mainstream selection of German features definitely had a definite
TV movie feel to it, but that is not necessarily a swear word these days. The shining directorial star was without doubt Berlin's Christian Petzold, who delivered with "Phoenix" and stands --together with his "muse", actor Nina Hoss-- heads above most other films I saw (
and was very well-received
and well-reviewed
and sold to the North American market within days, so you will get to see it in theatres soon).
You heard it here first: The next (2016) #Petzold film will be treatment of Anna Seghers' book "Transit".
Here's my #TIFF14 flashback in tweets:
German themes 2014:
+++ Watch & compare @tiff.net: PHOENIX + LABYRINTH OF LIES:
echoes of Holocaust in post-war #Germany.
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Euthanasia featured prominently -and delicately- (after last year's "Amour") with "Tour de Force" & "The Farewell Party".
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New German Wave: the well-made #thriller: #WhoAmI @BaranboOdar
Winners & Losers:
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Biggest disappointment: Daniel Bruehl in Michael Winterbottom's no-good "The Face of an Angel" (and I say that with love in my heart for Bruehl's talent and Winterbottom's classics "24 Hour Party People" and "Tristram Shandy". Can't win them all.)
+++
My best film: "Force Majeure". Generally,
Scandinavian films ruled my world (again/still - minus Liv Ullmann's somewhat tedious "Miss Julie"). Not sure the Nordic tourism boards see it that way, with child abuse & neglect, betrayal, psychological cruelty & physical violence the prevalent lifestyle choices on screen.
+++ If
Benedict #Cumberbatch doesn't win
@TheAcademy #Award for @ImitationGame, I will eat my shoe. (The film did win the TIFF Grolsch People's Choice Award.) It also was one of many films with Hitler jokes, always a crowd pleaser.
+++
Highlight of TIFF14: see photo (Petzold & Hoss talk at the Goethe-Institut, catch it on YouTube).
+++ Best TIFF14 idea (all our Berlin visitors agreed): pedestrianizing King & John. We should just keep it that way.
+++
Go see: our #TIFF14 Future Projections video commission by Lynne Marsh@ Scrap Metal Gallery before it goes to #Montreal Biennale!
& as always:
Thanks to our tireless (but probably tired) colleagues at Team TIFF & our friends and collaborators at German Films. See you next September!
by
Jutta Brendemühl
