 |
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
 |
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
 |
|
Afternoon |
|||
"Social relations are spiced up in Afternoon, a transposition of Chekhov’s The Seagull into a present time round dance of passive-aggressive rivalries in the setting of an obviously well-to-do circle of family and friends in a Potsdam villa. In this as in all of Schanelec’s films the real “action” lies not in the plot but in her cinematic modes of observation. Faces as well as cityscapes are presented in luminous compositions and subtly framed and blocked shots that very deliberately conceal as much as they reveal." – E Knörer, Vertigo Magazine "After an opening shot which is singularly incongruous with the rest of the film (more on that below), Schanelec moves the (in)action to a lakeside family cottage where Alex (Fritz Schediwy), the de facto patriarch of the clan, is slowly wasting away from chronic illness. He is tended by his 22-year-old nephew Konstantin (Jirka Zett), who has assumed this role out of a combination of unavoidable duty, no better options, and a desire to thumb his nose at his mother Irene (Schanelec), an actress who, according to the other members of the family, has always been cold and distant. Her exchanges with her older brother Alex play like Edward Albee-style verbal fisticuffs… These characters take no pleasure in hurting one another. They behave like sad, beaten animals sharing the same overcrowded pen, all too aware of the futility of rebellion. Why fight? As with Chekhov, Schanelec depicts a subset of society on the decline. Back to that bizarre opening shot. We see Irene in rehearsal (from the POV of someone behind the stage) petting a dog as part of a play. This “acting moment” is referred to later, since apparently it was only within this circumscribed, professional-obligation context that Irene could show such common tenderness. But perhaps more importantly, Schanelec identifies something genuine, even on the stage, in Irene’s engagement with her canine co-star, something that the listless bourgeois of her own clan can never retain.… As Anton C himself put it, “The more refined you are, the more unhappy.” – Michael Sicinski, academichack.net "Trained on the stage prior to her studies at the German Film and Television Academy in Berlin, which also yielded Petzold and Arslan — Schanelec not only incorporates theatre into her films but combines its lessons with the distinctive cinematic grammar she is progressively developing.… Schanelec crafts layered, winding dialogue that, when combined with the intensely close framings of her actors, exerts an almost mesmerizing pull. As she studies a familial clan of artists almost nonchalantly coming apart at the seams, Schanelec’s exacting, rigorous, exciting filmmaking reaches beyond individual psychopathology or canned domestic drama to touch on the enormous… forces which those fictions have been invented to contain. Though there is almost zero stylistic similarity, it’s nevertheless appropriate to contend that Schanelec is touching upon Bergman territory here, using the unique sensitivities of her artist-protagonists to probe the outer limits of human potential and frailty." – Andrew Tracy, mubi.com Presented in cooperation with the Goethe-Institut. |
|
||
| Nachmittag, Germany 2007 | |||
Director/Producer: Angela Schanelec With: Jirka Zett (Konstantin), Miriam Horwitz (Agnes), Angela Schanelec (Irene), Fritz Schediwy (Alex), Mark Waschke (Max), Agnes Schanelec (Mimmi), Katharina Linder (Astrid), Tobias Lenel (Martin), Karina Krawczyk (Polish housemaid) 97 mins, 35mm (1,85:1) In German, with English subtitles M content may disturb Hamilton Film Society |
|||
