Cine Me

 

          Barbara       

 

 

  http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2178941/

 

 

Barbara is a departure from distinctive German film-maker Christian Petzold's previous icy thrillers – an elegant drama based on human and political dilemmas.

 

Winner of the Best Director prize at this year's Berlin Film Festival, the latest film from Christian Petzold (Yella, Jerichow) is a simmering, impeccably crafted Cold War thriller, starring the gifted Nina Hoss-in her fifth lead role for the director-as a Berlin doctor banished to a rural East German hospital as punishment for applying for an exit visa.

 

Everything about Barbara is understated, to the point that it often seems as if not much is happening. But that's part of Petzold's skill. He has been making films in Germany for years — his best known pictures may be the 2007 Yella and the 2008 Jerichow, both featuring Hoss — and with luck, Barbara will bring him a larger audience. He's the kind of director and screenwriter (he wrote this screenplay with Harun Farocki) who can give a character a thoughtful soliloquy on a Rembrandt painting, like the one Andre delivers here, and make it seem perfectly natural.
And as shot by Hans Fromm, Barbara is beautiful to look at. There's no foreboding Eastern Bloc grimness here; instead, watching Barbara pedal through the rugged countryside on her bicycle, we're made acutely aware of the landscape's beauty. Barbara takes place in a country that would change drastically — or, perhaps more accurately, change drastically again — just nine years after its events. But Barbara, a woman in transition, can't wait. You can see why she has to keep moving.

 The end is quite surprising, and adds a nice and meaningful twist to a beautiful movie.


                                                                      (Recommended)