Tag Archives: German films

Movie Reviews, Perth Film Festival 2014-15

Phoenix movie review

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Featuring: Nina Hoss, Ronald Zehrfeld, Nina Kunzendorf
Director: Christian Petzold
Screenwriters: Christian Petzold, Harun Farocki; adapted from Hubert Monteilhet’s novel Le Retour des Cendres
Movie Website: www.phoenix-der-film.de/

2014-15 Lotterywest Perth Film Festival season dates:
Somerville: 30 March-5 April, 7.30pm
Joondalup Pines: 7-12 April, 7.30pm

Reviewer: rolanstein
Verdict: Some obvious credibility issues, but the film amounts to much more than the narrative, culminating in an emotional and dramatic powerhouse of a conclusion.

Review:
Phoenix director Christian Petzold’s previous film Barbara, set in pre-unification East Germany, was one of the best movies of the 2013-14 Perth International Film Festival. Phoenix is atmospherically and thematically similar, featuring a grim setting – in this case, a decimated post-war Berlin – and a female lead character (again played by the superb Nina Hoss) who finds a way to transcend her bleak circumstances by reclaiming her dignity and humanity against oppressive odds. Continue reading Phoenix movie review →

Movie Reviews

More Than Honey Movie Review

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Featuring: Fred Jaggi, John Miller, Heidrun Singer, Liane Singer, Randolf Menzel
Director: Markus Imhoof
Directors of Photography: Attila Boa, Jörg Jeshel
Website: www.ciber.science.uwa.edu.au/blog/

Reviewer: rolanstein
One-word summation: enthralling

Review:
More Than Honey was one of the most popular films featured at Cinema Paradiso’s recent German Film Festival, and for good reason. This is an extraordinary documentary from Oscar-nominated director Markus Imhoof that drops the viewer into the bee universe via some truly spectacular micro-photography, revealing some astonishing and sometimes profoundly disturbing details about these intriguing and vitally important insects. Continue reading More Than Honey Movie Review →