Everyone Else

Relationships are tricky...
`Alle Anderen' is an astonishingly good film that I really didn't see coming. It was recommended to me from some friends and it certainly looked up my ally (I'm surprised I didn't hear of it first myself) so I dove in without hesitation. What I found was something far deeper and far more profound than I expected.

It moved me.

The film is simple. It follows a young couple, Gitti and Chris, as they discover themselves and their relationship over a vacation in Italy. Chris and Gitti are a new couple. Although this isn't explicitly addressed, it is pretty obvious by their demeanor and their brand of turmoil. Childless and searching for direction in their relationship and their lives, Gitti and Chris seem like your average couple really. The beauty of it all is that they are. They are happy, not ridiculously so but certainly happy. They have their worries and problems and troubles but they don't hate one another and they don't want an out to their...

if you like bergman..
i'm pretty sure you will like this movie.

i was feeling particularly tired of big movies with overblown characters; this movie was exactly what i needed.

birgit minichmayr is fantastic. i wasn't familiar with her, now i am. she has a certain unstable punk subtext that keeps tension throughout. i am busy searching for more movies with her right now, no avail.

second, the realism in the relationship has a passion and frailty that reminds you of what it's like to be about a year in, still getting to know the other person, not sure if it will instantly blow up.

towards the end there is a small yet disturbing dinner party that captures a subtle moment. this reveals a lot about the character of the male protagonist. it's very nicely understated and yet has big implications. many small public social situations play on the couples insecurity. this insecurity, in particular with minichmayr's character, leads to an ending that was a surprise, but a...

complex, though occasionally inexplicable, look at a relationship
***1/2

Similar in style and tone to last year's "Blue Valentine," the German film "Everyone Else" provides us with an oblique look at a troubled relationship. Though the couple in this film does not seem as overtly unhappy as the one in the American work, there is still something clearly eating away at their relationship. The most admirable aspect of the screenplay by Maren Ade is that it doesn't throw easy labels onto either the characters or the problems they're facing. The movie is really more a piece of objective reportage chronicling their lives over the course of a few days than a plot- and theme-driven narrative leading us to a preordained conclusion about them as people.

Chris (Lars Eidinger) is a gifted but apparently not very successful architect, while Gitti (Birgit Minichmayr), his girlfriend, who works in the recording business, seems to be generally supportive of his efforts. Chris and Gitti are spending a relaxing vacation at his mother's home...

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