Love Kills

The fire fighter Markus is dancing absolutely drunken, with closed eyes and all by himself on a dancefloor in a village in Brandenburg. The guy is just slowly moving his head and arms while Robbie Williams sings "I just want to feel real loved, feel the world that I live in. 'Cause I got so much life running through my veins, going to waste...". In this very moment this simple man can overcome for one moment his own, ordinary life. And gets an alarming energy which leads him into the arms of a woman, who is not his wife.

Valeska Grisebach creates in her wonderful second movie "Sehnsucht" (“Longing“) a very realistic picture of the depressing day to day life of some Germany's countryside's inhabitants. In very long sequences she provides the spectator the needed liberty to reflect about the sensitively told story. After his misconduct, Grisebach's romantic main character can't decide whether he should stay with his wife, who he knows from his early childhood days or if he should choose to live with his affair Rose. In the end it aggrieves the big hearted Markus so much that he takes his shotgun and aims it to his heart. Grisebach even refers to Shakespeare in those parts. Love is worth dying for, because love is all we need, could be the essence of "Sehnsucht".

The amazingly honest and realistic movie captivates through its extraordinary approach. The director chose to hire laities, who she found in Berlin and Brandenburg – a perfect decision. Those new faces make the story authentic, so much that it sometimes seems just like a documentary. But the movie has a very poetic side as well. The images transfer a certain loneliness and abjection. Valeska Grisebach's contribution is definitely the best German movie in competition and would absolutely deserve a "Bear".

Anne von der Goenne

© Berlinale Talent Campus 2006