By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 3.5 cats
Director: Christian Petzold
Starring: Barbara Auer | Franz Rogowski | Godehard Giese | Lilien Batman | Maryam Zaree | Paula Beer
Country: france, germany
Year: 2019
Running time: 101
IMDB: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt6675244/reference
Chris says: “It’s a canny move to set the 1942 source material in the present day, and shrewder still for director Christian Petzold (PHOENIX) to indulge in stylistic motifs that one would find in a film from that era (most notably, the classic-sounding score.) Alas, the narration is a major distraction, Franz Rogowski is a more competent than necessarily engaging lead, and the ironic use of a certain 1980s song at the end feels off (it honestly worked better via its brief, jokey appearance in REALITY BITES.) 3 cats”
Martin responds: “I agree with Chris. I had a special interest in this movie – I read the book a long time ago as part of a university class on East German dissident writing. The ending song was just plain wrong. 3.5 cats”
Chris responds: “And I actually love that song, but it just didn’t work as an ending for this film.”
Michael says: “After viewing UNDINE, part of last year’s IFFBoston Fall Focus, and reading some reviews for Petzold’s earlier films, I decided to take a look at them for myself. I already enjoyed PHOENIX, a historic drama crossed with Hitchcock’s VERTIGO, and decided TRANSIT would be next up. I was particularly intrigued with this film because I couldn’t tell from the reviews if it was another historic drama, or a slice of speculative fiction; in addition, the stars of TRANSIT also happened to be the stars of UNDINE, Franz Rogowski and Paula Beer, both of whom I enjoyed greatly.