Clarissa Mora
The tone of this movie is interesting -- the stakes are both dramatic and high, but it's balanced with a lot of fun, tongue and cheek dialogue.
Horst in Translation ([email protected])
The German 2009 movie "Effi Briest" is one of the more recent and also more famous takes on the successful novel by Theodor Fontane. Director is Hermine Huntgeburth, writer is Volker Einrauch and this film here runs for a fairly impressive 2 hours. The title character is played by Julia Jentsch and other known names in here are Sebastian Koch, Misel Maticevic, Juliane Köhler and Thomas Thieme, a favorite of mine. So the cast here is certainly experienced and they all have been in successful films and won quite a fair share of awards during their long careers. So what is the reason the film did not work so well? Maybe it is that Jentsch was not the best choice for Briest here? I think she is a good actress, but usually one that delivers the most in rebellious characters with lots of dedication. Briest may be that too, at least to some extent, but the fact that she has to surrender to the rules of her era for almost the entire film requires a completely different skill set.Or maybe it is just me who is not really that interested in the entire story of Effi Briest. Admittedly, I also never read the book, which may have helped in appreciating this film more than I did. Still I believe that costume dramas and period pieces are are (besides science fiction) the one area, in which German films really almost never deliver. Tough to say what may be the grounds for that as there are many interesting works by German writers, who totally excelled, but if they could see these film adaptations, I am fairly certain they'd be mostly disappointed. As for this one here, it is simply not a particularly interesting and engaging watch and the last shot with Effi smiling while we see Koch's character look at her desperately was also fairly cringeworthy. A bad way to end the film. The best scene was possibly the dueling between Koch's and Maticevic's characters. This was really the only moment when I felt truly entertained. But this is obviously not enough, especially for a 2-hour-film. I do not recommend it. Maybe check out Fassbinder's approach instead, which I will soon as well.
kleiner_fuchs
-- mild spoiler --Not knowing the book or any of the films that are based on it, I was without prejudice when I sat down in the cinema, looking forward to a beautiful period piece.The cast is exquisite, no doubt about that; but some of the best German actors couldn't save this film from an empty script and a director who seems not to have had the slightest idea why she wanted to tell that particular story.Thinking back, I found that there where exactly two well-done scenes in the two tedious hours of the film:The first was Effi in her new home taking a bath. The housekeeper (the great Barbara Auer) enters and offers to wash her back. Effi is clearly uncomfortable about this but doesn't dare to say no. Does the housekeeper fail to notice Effi's embarrassment, or is she deliberately being cruel? Beautiful scene, full of suspense.The second scene is near the end, when Effi's little daughter is finally send to visit her outcast mother. The child, obviously instructed to act cold by her father and/or housekeeper, doesn't move her face and gives only very short answers, and Effi gets more and more desperate. This was a touching scene, and I asked myself: How come that after two hours with all these capable actors acting so hard and showing so much emotion, the best scene is about a little child, just sitting there, not moving a muscle of her face at all?The editing of this film is without style and rhythm, the music is unimaginative and boring, but even worse is the cinematography. It's shot in CinemaScope, but why? Apart from some landscapes and interiors, most of them badly framed, we get mainly close-ups, close-ups and more close-ups. There's nothing more pathetic than shooting on CinemaScope and not knowing what to do with it.
