On Tuesday, Ethan Hawke came to the Berlinale to present his new film. He could have presented a film for the Retrospective as well, as his Before Sunrise is one of the films of the 1990s that perfectly captures the spirit of that time and won a Silver Bear for Best Director. Unfortunately, Before Sunrise is not being shown in the Retrospective... And so it remained with his acclaimed appearance at the Zoo Palast, the "beautiful cinema" as he called it.
The Zoo Palast is truly the most beautiful cinema in the entire festival, always impressing filmmakers with its size and elegance. It really does provide a festive setting for a glamorous premiere, whether it's a star-studded special event, a passionately produced generational film or a panorama film with an excited director who can hardly believe he's standing on stage here.
The Weight
The Weight is the weight of the gold bars that Murphy (Ethan Hawke) and three fellow prisoners have to carry through the woods to smuggle them out of the mine. Only then will he have a chance of getting his release papers from his corrupt camp supervisor (Russell Crowe) early and getting his daughter out of the orphanage in time before she is put up for adoption. Of course, their journey does not go unnoticed, and gold prospectors are hot on their heels.
Set during the Great Depression of 1933, the film is a solid, atmospherically dense action film whose beautifully captured images and moods set it apart from the genre. Ethan Hawke gives his character Murphy enough complexity to make him compelling, and Russell Crowe manages to create a sinister figure behind a friendly façade in his few scenes. But the real star of the film is the soundtrack, which, through sounds such as the breaking of bones, adds to the film's menace.
The retrospective
"Lost in the 90s" is the motto of this year's retrospective – so the films are not that old, and yet they and their attitude to life seem to be from another time. The films have been selected under three themes: "Berlin", "East Meets West" and "The End of History". So it's not the big blockbusters of the time that are being shown, but films that capture the spirit of change at that time.
American independent films such as Richard Linklater's Slacker and Spike Lee's Boys in the Hood convey the spirit of that era, even if Before Sunrise and Reality Bites , two films that captured the spirit of youth in the 1990s like no other, are unfortunately missing. Instead, the retrospective offers the rare opportunity to see rarities such as Gorillas Bathes at Noon and Berlin, Bahnhof Friedrichstraße 1990, images of Berlin , at a time when the Wall had fallen but was still partly standing.
