Hey folks, Harry here... I've got a terrible feeling that we'll never get to see EDEN theatrically in the United States... It just sounds like it's of a genre that we don't get too many of here... a German Romantic Comedy. Nevermind that what Elaine describes sounds like an absolutely fascinating, funny, poignant and captivating film. Can you name a German Romantic Comedy that's been widely distributed here? Me either. Not in a very long time. Then LOOK BOTH WAYS also sounds really entertaining as well. Here they are - and beware of spoilers!
35TH ROTTERDAM INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL
Today's reviews are of two German and Australian films
which are proving quite a hit with the Rotterdam
audience. One of them, the German romantic comedy
"Eden" (which got its world première in Rotterdam a
few days ago), currently tops the Audience Award
standings, by quite a hefty margin; there's a good
chance it will end up winning the award. The other
film, Australia's "Look Both Ways", is currently
ranked 14th, but I wouldn't be surprised if it, too,
ended up in the top-10. Both films are very accessible
and highly entertaining, and will probably be released
in quite a few countries around the world, so even if
you're not all that much into arthouse films, these
movies may be worth keeping an eye on.
LOOK BOTH WAYS
(Written and directed by Sarah Watt)
At last year's Australian Film Institute Awards, Sarah
Watt's début feature took quite a few of the top
honours, including Best Film. It's easy to see why.
"Look Both Ways" is an excellent ensemble drama of the
"Short Cuts" variety which makes light of serious
subjects and not only gets away with it, but actually
ends up being tremendously uplifting. Not bad for a
film which positively wallows in death.
"Look Both Ways" centres on a train accident in
Adelaide. One sweltering Friday afternoon, a man tries
to stop his dog being run over by a train and is
killed himself. A young woman who has just buried a
parent, Meryl, witnesses the accident. At the scene of
the accident, she meets Andy, a journalist, and his
colleague Nick, a photo journalist. As it happens,
Nick and Andy have a few worries of their own. Nick
has just been diagnosed with cancer, possibly
terminal, while Andy has just heard his ex-girlfriend
is pregnant. The rest of the film follows the next few
days in the lives of these three people. We see Meryl,
an illustrator, working hard to meet a work deadline,
and failing miserably because she falls in love with
Nick. We see Nick obsessing about his chances of
survival and trying hard to break the news of his
illness to those near and dear to him, but never quite
managing to muster the courage. We follow the
self-centred Andy, who not only has no idea how to
deal with the pregnant girlfriend situation, but feels
underappreciated in his job, and takes his frustration
out on others. And in the background we catch glimpses
of other people directly or indirectly affected by the
accident: Andy and Nick's editor Phil, who tries hard
to be supportive but doesn't really know how to go
about it; Andy's girlfriend Anna, who has to decide
whether to keep her baby or not; the wife of the train
accident victim, who can't quite believe what has
happened; and last but not least, the train driver who
caused the accident, who is so stunned with horror and
guilt that he doesn't speak a word all weekend.
Together, these people make up a wonderful cast of
realistic, well-drawn characters who are all beset by
worries and try hard to hang in there. As it happens,
they're all very likeable characters, which makes it
easy to identify with them -- an important quality in
any film, but especially in films with a large cast,
such as this.
If there is one word that describes "Look Both Ways",
it is "death-obsessed". Death is ubiquitous in the
film, and it's analysed from nearly every possible
angle. There are characters who have lost someone.
There are characters who are quite unexpectedly
confronted with their own mortality. There are
characters who have caused death, characters who may
be about to cause death, and characters who may or may
not be contemplating suicide. The film even raises
questions as to whether it's ethical to profit from
death -- whether or not it's OK to take pictures of
dead people and their widows, and whether it's
acceptable to put those pictures on the front page of
a newspaper. And yet for all its obsession with death,
"Look Both Ways" is a remarkably light-hearted film.
Sure, it has heart-wrenching moments, moments to which
everyone who's ever lost anyone or contemplated his
own mortality will be able to relate, but by and
large, it's an optimistic tale, with a healthy dose of
romance, an equally healthy dose of humour and some
wicked Aussie irony to boot. Meryl gets to deliver
some very funny lines, and the way Andy takes his
mounting frustration out on innocent bystanders is
nothing short of hilarious. And then there are the
inserts, which add a brilliant touch of comedy to the
film.
You see, both Meryl and Nick suffer from run-away
imaginations. Meryl, who has quite a morbid streak, is
so aware of the myriad ways in which people can die
that she constantly imagines herself falling victim to
some lethal accident and/or disease. These wild
imaginings are inserted into the film as animated
sequences (drawn in Meryl's own artistic style), and
are frequently laugh-out-loud funny. For his part,
Nick is just as death-obsessed, albeit in a slightly
different way. His mind keeps running to the cancer
statistics he has been reading. Nick being a
photographer, these statistics naturally assume the
form of photo montages which haunt him at opportune
and less opportune moments. Like Meryl's wild
imaginings, Nick's mental photo montages are inserted
"Run Lola Run"-style into the main story, quite often
right in the middle of a dialogue or a scene, and
while they're not as hilarious as Meryl's sequences,
they do add considerably to the development of the
story, in ways both original and effective.
I could go on and on about what makes "Look Both Ways"
such a wonderful film, but since I'm too busy to write
a truly epic-length review of the film, I'll just say
that everything works. The script is excellent; the
separate storylines wind in and out of each other in a
believable way, and the situations in which the
characters find themselves feel both real and natural,
with plenty of well-written dialogue and well-observed
little details to keep things entertaining. The
acting, too, is wonderful -- natural, understated, and
convincing all around. Justine Clarke (Meryl), Anthony
Hayes (Andy) and William McInnes (Nick) are wonderful
leads, with McInnes (the director's real-life husband)
being on particularly fine form as the
frozen-with-fear photographer. Ultimately, however,
what makes "Look Both Ways" the gem it is is its
sincerity. Watt doesn't need sugar or a sledgehammer
to make the viewer care about her characters and their
misfortunes; the fear, loss, anger, pain, grief and
hesitation her characters experience are so natural
and universal that manipulation is unnecessary. As a
result, "Look Both Ways" is a very honest film, which
is moving without being manipulative, and genuine
without being depressing. It may be steeped in death,
but it's full of love and laughter, and at the end of
the day, it's really quite life-affirming. In other
words, it's a wonderful little movie, quite deserving
of the praise that has been heaped upon it in its
homeland. Here's hoping the rest of the world will
fall for its charms, as well.
EDEN
(Written and directed by Michael Hoffman)
Gregor Barbier loooooooooves food. He doesn't just
like it, like you and I and everyone we know; he
genuinely loves it, to the point where he'll stare at
his ingredients for hours, talk to them, hold them,
smell them, cuddle them, enact little plays with them,
and, when the mood is upon him, lick them. Since he
likes food so much, he naturally becomes a cook. And
not just any cook, but an award-winning chef, owner of
a tiny, exclusive restaurant which specialises in
"erotic cuisine" -- food designed to make people fall
in love and/or lust. Business is booming, and Gregor
keeps on discovering exciting new recipes, so he
should be happy, shouldn't he? But he's not. You see,
Gregor is rather fat and insecure, and seemingly
incapable of having a normal conversation with beings
he does not intend to chop up and fry. That is, until
he meets Eden, a beautiful young woman who waitresses
at the café where Gregor likes to have his coffee.
After some very funny initial hiccups, Gregor and Eden
hit it off, and very quickly, Gregor begins to develop
romantic feelings for Eden, which he expresses through
the delicious meals he cooks for her. Needless to say,
Eden is seduced by Gregor's cooking, because who could
resist food cooked with so much love? Yet very little
actually happens between the two friends, because
first of all, Eden doesn't appear to be aware of her
feelings for Gregor, and secondly, she's married with
children. And inconveniently enough, Eden's husband
actually seems like a nice fellow, although he does
like to visit strip clubs once in a while. So how is
insecure Gregor going to win Eden's heart? Is he even
going to try? Will our seemingly ill-matched couple,
who are so clearly made for each other, come to an
understanding, or will fate manage to keep them apart?
The latest in a series of films about the relationship
between love and food (see also "Like Water for
Chocolate", "Eat Drink Man Woman", "Chocolat", "Bella
Martha", etc.), "Eden" is a delightful romcom by
Michael Hoffman, who wowed German critics and viewers
with his 2002 film "Sophiiiie!". Not that "Eden" is
anything like "Sophiiiie!". Gentle rather than
provocative, and much more straightforward and
accessible than its predecessor, "Eden" is as
mainstream a feel-good movie as you can get, albeit a
superbly crafted one. The story, which focuses almost
entirely on Gregor, Eden and Eden's husband Xaver, is
straighforward and frankly somewhat predictable. The
character arcs aren't anything we haven't seen before.
They basically go as follows: a taciturn, eccentric
man who has spent too much time on his own learns to
open up; a charming young woman who is great at
fooling herself learns to understand her own feelings
and those of others; and a nice, ever so likeable
husband is so consumed with jealousy that he gradually
turns into a somewhat less likeable husband. So far,
it could be a TV Movie of the Week, and an utterly
forgettable one at that. The difference is that "Eden"
was written by a pro -- someone with a keen eye for
character and details, a great ear for confrontational
dialogue (Gregor and Eden's first real conversation is
a classic) and the guts to be a little sentimental and
grotesque when needed, without ever going overboard.
As a result, "Eden" is elevated from the ranks of the
merely predictable films to the ranks of the
predictable films which also happen to be completely
charming. It may be fluff, but it's utterly engaging
fluff, of the kind which keeps you smiling for minutes
on end and then has you laughing out loud. You could
do worse on a Friday evening.
I've been trying for days to figure out why "Eden"
works as well as it does, but without much success.
With hindsight, I can pinpoint a number of minor flaws
in the film, but while I was watching it, I enjoyed
the hell out of it, as indeed did everyone else at the
screening. So I can only assume that it's one of those
films where the whole is greater than the sum of its
parts. As for what those parts are...
Well, first of all, there's the acting. Naturally, a
comedy which largely focuses on two leads depends on
the attractiveness of those leads, and Josef Ostendorf
(Gregor) and Charlotte Roche (Eden) deliver in spades.
Ostendorf's Gregor starts out as a larger-than-life
figure, whose eccentricity, awkwardness and rudeness
are such that one cannot help laughing at him.
However, he becomes a completely different person when
he's cooking, and his kitchen persona is so nice and
unassuming, not to mention so infectious in its
enthusiasm for food, that one develops real sympathy
for him. As the film progresses, one comes to both
admire and deplore Gregor's restraint towards Eden,
wishing him to take the plunge and tell her what he
feels for her, but at the same time understanding
completely why he doesn't. As for Eden herself, she's
a little too naive and one-dimensional to be of real
interest, but there's no denying that she oozes charm.
She's a very warm personality -- just the sort of girl
to rescue a man like Gregor from his half-chosen,
half-imposed isolation. The fact that for three
quarters of the film she doesn't seem to realise just
how much of an effect she has on Gregor -- or how much
of an effect he has on her -- makes her a little dumb,
but it doesn't mar the film. On the contrary, it's
quite entertaining to watch Eden come up with silly
excuses and white lies to spend more time with Gregor
and his wonderful food -- particularly since her white
lies are all so delightfully transparent. On the
whole, Eden's part is less demanding than Gregor's,
but Roche makes the most of it, infusing Eden with
such enthusiasm that it's obvious why Gregor should
love her so much. As a result, one really wants these
characters to get together, which is all a romcom
really needs to be successful.
As for the supporting cast, they also do an excellent
job. Devid Striesow is tragically ridiculous as Eden's
husband Xaver, who has the kind of job no one in his
right mind could take seriously; their five-year-old
daughter Leonie is a sweet and loveable presence in
the background, and Xaver's booze-and-boobs-loving
friends add a welcome touch of laddishness to the
otherwise rather feminine proceedings. Between the lot
of them, they inject such infectious charm into the
film that it's hard not to be enchanted by it. The
fact that it's full of mouth-watering images of food
just makes it that much harder to resist. Because
let's face it, at the end of the day no one can resist
great food. Least of all when it's conjured up on the
screen with such flair and gusto.
If it weren't for the mildly depressing final fifteen
minutes, I'd call "Eden" the best date film of the
year. It's smart, it's funny, it's unabashedly
romantic, and unlike most romcoms, it has as much to
offer to male viewers as it does to female viewers. At
the screening I attended, the film actually seemed
more popular with male viewers than with female
viewers, which has to be something of a first for a
romcom. Either way, it's a delightful film which
deserves to be seen by a wide audience -- hardly very
original, but every bit as seductive as one of
Gregor's special dishes.
As I said, you could do worse on a Friday evening.
Elaine
