Classic Movie Review: The Forest for the Trees (2003)

The Forest for the Trees (2003) 

Directed by: Maren Ade.

Written by: Maren Ade.

Starring: Eva Löbau (Melanie Pröschle), Daniela Holtz (Tina Schaffner), Jan Neumann (Thorsten Rehm), Ilona Schulz (Frau Sussmann), Robert Schupp (Tobias), Heinz Röser-Dümmig (Lutger Reinhardt), Martina Eckrich (Renate Pföhler), Nina Fiedler (Bine), Hans-Rüdiger Kucich (Gerd Postweiler), Ruth Köppler (Elvira Fischer-Walter), Achim Enchelmaier (Bernd), Monika Hirschle (Melanies Mutter), Volker Jeck (Melanies Vater).

 

It’s fairly remarkable that The Forest for the Trees is not only Maren Ade’s debut film – but also a student film. The evidence at the time was clear that she would go onto become a master – as she has with her two subsequent films, Everybody Else and Toni Erdman (and it’s a shame that there’s only been two, with such huge gaps between all of her films). And people immediately recognized that talent – the film went to be featured at TIFF and Sundance, and thankfully, with the success of Ade’s two other films, is now available for us all to see – and marvel about how she seemed to emerge right from the start a fully formed artist.

 

The protagonist of The Forest for the Trees is the painfully awkward and idealist Melanie (a great Eva Löbau) – a new teacher, who moves to a new city, breaks up with her boyfriend, and takes a job teaching a troubled class. She is convinced that she’ll be able to reach them with her “new teaching methods”. At the same time, she tries to make new friends – all of the teachers, except for one, pretty much ignore her – and are mean behind her back. She does make friends – kind of – with her neighbor across the street, whose apartment she can see into. This is Tina (Daniela Holtz) – who seems happy enough to spend time with Melanie if there is nothing better to do – but frequently forgets to call when she says she will, or invite her places, etc. Melanie keeps trying – and its painful to watch her try and integrate herself in the life of someone who clearly just doesn’t care about her that much. Painful to see her try and interact with her friends, or her on again/off again boyfriend. And its equally painful to watch her in class, try and reach these kids who sense blood in the water, and go for her immediately. The Forest for the Trees is a movie designed to make you squirm and be uncomfortable from beginning to (almost) the end.

 

The key for The Forest for the Trees working as well as it does is that Melanie is both sympathetic and annoying. If she was just annoying, then the film may flip into obnoxious territory – punching down at the character. But Melanie, for the most part, seems like a nice person – that she really does care for those kids, that the talk behind her back really does hurt her, that she really is looking out for Tina’s best interests – and wants to be her friend. She is just utterly, completely clueless at reading the social clues she is being given. You can both understand why the others view her the way they do – it is annoying to be a veteran teacher, and have someone come in and imply you are bad at your job. It is annoying when an acquaintance – which is really what she is to Tina – oversteps their bounds, and think you are closer than you want. And yet, she is so guileless, and these slights hurt so much that you cringe because it’s so awkward, but also because a character you like is being repeatedly hit.

 

And then, there is the ending of the film. As you watch the film – and its short, at just over 80 minutes – you wonder how Ade is going to end it. And Ade finds the most unexpected, and yet perfect way to end the film – an ending that is freeing for Melanie – and for us in its strange, surreal way. Ade has become one of the best filmmakers in the world – I really wish she would work more often – but as this film shows, she is brilliant right from the start.

Movie Review: Toni Erdmann

Toni Erdmann

Directed by: Maren Ade.

Written by: Maren Ade.

Starring: Peter Simonischek (Winfried Conradi / Toni Erdmann), Sandra Hüller (Ines Conradi), Lucy Russell (Steph), Michael Wittenborn (Henneberg), Thomas Loibl (Gerald), Trystan Pütter (Tim), Hadewych Minis (Tatjana), Ingrid Bisu (Anca), Vlad Ivanov (Illiescu).

 

Maren Ade’s Toni Erdmann is one of the great comedies of recent years – and also one of the longest at nearly three hours. That length is usually death to a comedy – most of which start to feel kind of played out at around the 90 minute mark, and can feel deadly if they hit two hours. And yet, in the case of Toni Erdmann’s, it’s length’s is one of its greatest strengths – as it really does allow you time to get to know its two central characters in detail – which makes the comic set pieces (and the last hour has two of the greatest I’ve ever seen) hit harder, both in terms of making you laugh, and making you feel something deeper for these two characters. The fact that Ade is able to pack so much more into its runtime – so effectively – actually makes you wonder how she was able to do it in just 162 minutes.

 

The story is about a work-alholic, 30 something year old woman, Ines (Sandra Huller) – a German, now living in Bucharest, Romania – and working on a presentation to keep a major contract with an oil company. Her lonely father, Winfried (Peter Simonischek), is a teacher and a practical joker – he enjoys donning disguises – including ridiculous false teeth – and making everyone around him laugh – the problem being it seems like that isn’t very many people anymore. He shows up in Bucharest uninvited and unannounced – and Ines does her best over the course of a long, awkward weekend, to both do her job – and please her father. At the end, he supposedly goes home – but not really. He’ll show up again – now in disguise as “businessman and life coach” Toni Erdmann, complete with a horrible wig and even worse false teeth – and follow her around. She doesn’t exactly play along – but she doesn’t out him either to any of her friends or colleagues – thinking, probably rightly, that the truth would be worse for her than simply putting up with this vulgar idiot her father is pretending to be. Through the course of the movie, both of them do things designed to get other each other’s skin.

 

The film is mainly about this fraught, father-daughter dynamic – which is not something we see too much of in movies, which seem to like to stick along gender lines (father/son or mother/daughter movies are the norm). At first, the two of them seem so different – Winfried is more of a free spirit, who says and does whatever he wants, and just wants to have fun. Ines is all business, professional and courteous, more competent than most of the men around her. Yet, both of them are playing roles – under both of their very different demeanors, are two lonely, depressed people. They are both putting on an act for everyone around them at all times, and not letting anyone see them too closely. We see this play out in various ways throughout the film.

 

The fact that Ade can then add in a lot of other stuff to this father/daughter narrative is even more impressive. The film is a fairly clear picture of the misogyny still faced by many women in the business world – from the way Ines realizes she is taken more seriously at a work site when she shows up with her idiot father in his business man guise than when she was there before by herself, or the way she reacts to her co-worker and sometimes sex partner when he tells her that their boss told him not to fuck her too much, because he doesn’t want her to lose her edge (that scene by itself, is an understated comic gem). The film certainly doesn’t make Ines into some sort of flawless character either though – she can be downright cold and uncaring, not just to her father, but also to the workers who are going to lose their jobs if the company listens to her.

 

It’s all of this – the close observation of her characters and the world they inhabit – that makes the final hour of Ade’s film so brilliant. By this point, she has firmly established them – and then she completely lets lose in a sustained, ambitious go-for-broke finale that has a one-two punch of a rendition of one of the cheesiest pop songs in history, and a naked brunch, that you aren’t likely to forget. Then, she wraps it all up with a scene that while perhaps isn’t a particularly happy ending, its certainly something – and shows perhaps how both of these characters have grown, if only a little bit. This is one of the year’s best film.

Movie Review: Everyone Else

Everyone Else ****
Directed by: Maren Ade.
Written By: Maren Ade.
Starring: Birgit Minichmayr (Gitti), Lars Eidinger (Chris), Hans-Jochen Wagner (Hans), Nicole Marischka (Sana).

Everyone Else is at times a painful film to watch. It is film about a relationship between two young people that has come to an impasse. There are very few movies that detail this time in a couple relationship – the honeymoon period where simply being with each other was good enough is over, but they have yet to figure out if they are really going to be together long term. They have trouble communicating with each other – both holding back too many secrets from the other one. At the end of the film, you cannot tell if it’s a happy or sad ending – because it’s not really an ending at all.

Chris (Lars Eidinger) is a young architect who is struggling to find work. He is ambitious, and has a lot of big ideas, but is too idealistic. He refuses to compromise on anything, and as such, the people who hire architects – who want some input into what they are paying for – are often looking elsewhere. He remains lost in his own head – reading constantly and talking a big game that is leading nowhere. On the other hand Gitti (Birgit Minichmayr) is a somewhat flighty, impulsive publicist for a bunch of bands no one has ever heard of. She is more impulsive than Chris, and often cannot stop herself from rambling on and on – even though it embarrasses Chris. This German couple is vacationing in Sardinia, staying in the home of Chris’ wealthy parents, although they spend much time insulting their bourgeois surroundings.

The two, it seems, have a real problem with communication. Chris cannot bring himself to say “I love you” to Gitti – instead answering her words with only a kiss. He also cannot admit to her when he loses out on yet another contract bid, because his design was too complex. This doesn’t come out until a dinner with two “friends” of Chris’ from Germany – Hans, a former classmate of Chris’, who is doing well financially, and his wife Sana. These two seem to be a mirror of Chris and Gitti – and yet they are happy, and successful in their jobs and with each other, and are about to welcome their first baby. The tension at this dinner – and one later in the movie – is palpable, because it’s clear that Chris hates Hans, and yet yearns for his approval. He even gets mad at Gitti for defending him when Hans goes on a patronizing spiel about his career. This two scenes are the real heart of the film – they show the future of what Chris and Gitti could become if they choose to – and they don’t much like it.

There comes a time in everyone’s lives when a decision has to be made. At certain times, you have to compromise your ideals in order to get the job done. Chris seems unwilling to do this – he has his vision, and even if no one else out there agrees with him, he will stick by it to the bitter end. And this is the attitude he takes with Gitti as well – he knows what he wants in a girlfriend, and will not compromise his ideals for her. Gitti tries so hard to make Chris happy – but is reaching a point where she wonders if she ever will be able to – and whether she still wants to even try. She has her own issues – torn between wanted to be comfortable, and becoming too bourgeois, she fights hopelessly with herself about a dress she bought, and yet is embarrassed when Chris insults his mother’s love of knickknacks.

Everyone Else is not an easy film to watch. It really does lay these two people bare in front of us in way that brought to mind Ingmar Bergman’s Scenes from a Marriage, about the years in the life of a couple who is married than divorced but are constantly drawn back to each other. This movie has that same sense of honesty – the same unblinking gaze and willingness to follow these two people further down in the mess they have created. It is an uncomfortable film to say the least. Yet writer director Maren Ade, with a great assist from her two great actors, has done something truly great in the film. Whether we want to admit it or not, at one point we were all Chris and Gitti.