Movie
Berlinale begins with a big question mark
Actress Anne Ratte-Polle on the red carpet at the Berlinale. Photo: Britta Pedersen/dpa-Zentralbild/dpa
© dpa-infocom GmbH
Corona tests are carried out in front of the festival cinema – and in the hall the audience wears a mask. Even after two years of the pandemic, the pictures from the Berlinale seem as if someone had inserted the wrong film.
It’s a delicate matter. When directors try to remake old classics, they have to be measured against it. It’s the same with the opening film of the Berlinale. With the 72nd edition, one of the largest film festivals in the world started on Thursday evening in Berlin.
To start with, «Peter von Kant», the new film by French director François Ozon, will be shown. The film festival in Berlin – they are back despite the pandemic.
In the audience, people are now wearing mouth and nose protection and corona tests are being carried out in front of the cinema. In the morning the hotel corridors are unusually empty, in the evening guests wave on the red carpet. Autograph hunters wear FFP2 masks. It has long been discussed whether this is a good idea – a film festival in the omicron wave. Minister of State for Culture Claudia Roth calls out resolutely: “We won’t let Corona get us down.”
Opening film by François Ozon
The opening film takes you to an apartment in Cologne in the 1970s: the director Peter (Denis Ménochet) treats his assistant Karl quite miserably and falls in love with the young Amir. The film is based on a template by none other than Rainer Werner Fassbinder (1945-1982). “He was like a kind of big brother for me,” says Ozon (54, “Swimming Pool”). He’s seen all of his films.
The film shows a lot of retro optics. Fluffy carpets, baroque pictures and people smoking cocaine whose relationships eventually escalate. “I believe that human beings are made to need other human beings. But he hasn’t learned how to be together.” This passage from the original also appears in the new edition.
However, Ozon changes one crucial point: while “The bitter tears of Petra von Kant” tells the story of a tyrannical fashion designer who falls in love with a female model, Ozon casts the story with men. But why actually?
The change of perspective – from a lesbian to a gay story – brings no gain in narrative weight. Fassbinder’s focus on lesbian love has also led to reflections on gender roles. Nothing of the sort can be found with ozone. The film remains too private for that.
Isabelle Adjani plays one of the main roles
Some scenes allow the interpretation that the film could be interpreted as a satire on the mendacity of human interaction in show business. However, if this is attempted at all, it is told too feebly and tearfully. Or does Ozon want to break away from his great role model Fassbinder? Why else is he making a ridiculous figure out of him?
Isabelle Adjani, one of the great stars of French cinema, plays one of the main roles. But she didn’t come to Berlin. Actress Hanna Schygulla is also missing. She has already played in Fassbinder’s film – 50 years later she can now be seen in a different role in the new edition.
The festival director assured her that everything would take place under the highest security measures. “But even if people have the triple vaccination, they can transmit it. It’s nothing for someone like me,” Schygulla told the Berliner Zeitung. According to the newspaper, the 78-year-old said on a phone call from Paris that she had not been in Berlin for so long due to Covid. “I took it very seriously now because I lost a few friends and acquaintances to the disease.”
Schygulla said of the Fassbinder film: «I didn’t identify with the role at the time either. I said to Fassbinder: Let me out of such roles in the future. Then he was so offended. I thought the role was awful. Very flat as a character study. I didn’t like myself in the film either. I didn’t like the whole movie.” But he was very, very successful. Of course, that made her think. She doesn’t like the ozone film any better either. “But it’s well done.”