Afire, Christian Petzold’s smouldering and mesmeric
exploration of artistic aspirations/inadequacies, creative process and
self-discovery, might well be his most beguiling film to date. The Rohmeresque conversational
style, languid intimacy of its setting, and unfolding relationships that’re
charged yet mellow – attributes which likened it to a dry comedy of manners meets
lazy hangout film, and therefore decidedly removed from his prior films – stunningly
pivoted into a more melancholic, moody and elusive work by its end with hints
of ecological commentary, splashes of bittersweet unrequited yearning and
dazzling metafictional elements that infused new meanings into the proceedings
thus far. The second chapter in his planned trilogy on mythical elements transposed
into contemporaneous settings – Undine had water as its motif, while it’s
fire here – and his third collaboration with the effortlessly effervescent
Paula Beer (their first film together was Transit, an exquisite
interpretation of Anna Seghers’ extraordinary novel of the same name), it’s
centred on grumpy, irascible and self-centred writer Leon (Thomas Schubert)
who’s come over to a summer holiday lodge on the Baltic Sea, along with his
friend Felix (Langston Uibel), for an artists’ retreat of sorts where he plans
to complete his second novel before meeting his editor while Felix works on his
photography portfolio. With a nature alternating between edgy and pompous, he becomes
subliminally conflicted upon finding himself in the company of the vivacious
and nonchalant Nadja (Beer), who sells ice creams, has noisy romping sessions
in the night, and harbours a hidden literary side; meanwhile, the ominous
foreshadowing of forest fires looms in the backdrop. Buoyed by sun-kissed photography
and a sparingly used score, this is a deceptively electrifying work by a
filmmaker breaking new artistic grounds.
Director: Christian Petzold
Genre: Drama/Psychological Drama/Romantic Drama
Language: German
Country: Germany
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