World premiere on the Lido, a better place can’t imagine Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck for his new Film. “Work without the author” is also a tribute to the German artist Gerhard Richter.
For him, it was the most important film festival in the world, says Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck in an interview with Deutsche Welle. The Festival in Venice is a mirror of the story, the Director says, and refers to the years of proximity to the Biennale to fascism. Just as it was for the dawn of cinema in the 1960s, symbolized by the Golden lion for the German Alexander Kluge in the Upheaval of 1968.
Fascism and the arts, as the great film themes
Now is von Donnersmarck, who has the big stage of the film ten years ago were so brilliant with his later, Oscar-winning Stasi Drama “the lives of Others” to enter, even in the center of the action on the Lido. “Work without the author”, the third Film of the Director, witnessed on Tuesday in the festival Palace, world premiere. And, on this short question sums up the movie, and also in “work without the author” is about fascism and the dawn of art in the 60s.
The artist Kurt Barnert (Tom Schilling) and his girlfriend Ellie (Paula Beer)
“Work without the author” is not a key film, “in the I only out of politeness the names have changed,” says von Donnersmarck. And yet the Film at crucial moments is based on the biography of the German painter stars Gerhard Richter. In the Film the artist is, the way of the spectators during the three-hour film followed Kurt Barnert. Of growing up during the Second world war in Dresden, his beloved aunt introduces him to the art, attended one of the national socialists organized the “degenerate art”exhibition. The aunt, mentally unstable, and is later murdered under the Nazi euthanasia programme of the Nazis.
“Work without the author” is also a great love story
Years later, the young Kurt Barnert again, now he’s an art student in the GDR. With the simple Ideals of socialist art, he can’t make friends. Consolation for him, the young Ellie, the woman he falls in love. What does he know Kurt: Ellie’s father, now in the service of the SED medical Profession, was, during the Nazi responsible for the death of the beloved aunt.
Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck
In a further leap in time the audience experiences then, as Kurt escapes with Ellie in the West, and his studies at the düsseldorf art Academy. There is a key scene in the Professor Anthony van Verten is the young Kurt the decisive impulse to free himself from ready-made aesthetic paths. Kurt Barnert begins his very personal memories into a work of art. He takes the fate of his murdered by the Nazis aunt. It is images that do not happen to remember to the art of Gerhard Richter, in form and content.
The Film tells the early years of Gerhard Richter
Richter celebrated in 1964, his first solo exhibition under the title of “Gerd Richter. Photo images, Portraits, and families.” From then on it went uphill with the career of the artist who is today regarded as one of the world’s most important and especially most expensive artist. The beginnings up to the artistic breakthrough of the Film “a work without the author describes,” then the story of the Kurt Barnert (alias Gerhard Richter), after 188 minutes of the movie to the end.
Kurt Barnert over the access to your own biography to a personal artistic language
He was “taken in the drawing of the figures of freedom,” which he had used, to tell his story, says Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck. The Film did not want to documentary. Three hours of great cinema, German history in several stages, many well-known actors, dramatic music, and in many Places effective direction – nobody would have the idea that “work without the author” is documentary.
But the Parallels are obvious. Not only the inverter to track, individuals are copied to the smallest Detail of reality. So the düsseldorf art Professor Anthony van, for example, is none other than Joseph Beuys Verten.
Donnersmarck’s view on the German art
“Work without the author” is a special history of cinema. A Film about the national socialist crimes of East German art, doctrines, and political control in the GDR, a movie but also about the dawn of the art in West Germany, Beuys and abstraction. “I think that every great work of art is a fabric of redundant proof that it is possible to transform a dream into something Positive,” says the Director in respect of a statement made by Gerhard Richter. The had answered the question, what is the Power of art would be: He does not think that the word “Makes” is wrong, for him, art had no Power, it is rather there to give comfort.
In his teaching – and years of Barnert in many styles of art, trying, here at Action Painting
Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck has rotated with “work without the author” a German historical epic for the cinema, however, also has its weaknesses. Some sequences, such as the scenes in the düsseldorf art Academy, textbook fashion, a little nerdy in your claim, if possible, all of the then-current art debates. The Film has to tell during his over three-hour runtime, a lot, appears to be overloaded. Also, the “clean” equipment to many of the scenes that we know from so many German cinema and TV Geschichtsepen bother. The “smells” more like a Studio, as it would give a real life vividly.
A poignant story about the suffering under the Nazis
This is a shame. Because “work without the author”, has won the German preselection for the foreign Oscar, also offers great scenes that touch the heart. The story of the little Kurt Barnert and his aunt alone would have been a Film worth. Also, the re-encounter of the young artist with the former Nazi doctor, to son-in-law and then even Kurt’s father, is an emotional, thrilling piece of cinema. The actors are terrific, especially Tom Schilling in the lead role convinces with its mix of sensitivity, silent rage and melancholy.
The Mexican Director Guillermo del Toro will have to decide as a Chairman of the jury, whether “work without the author” is excellent
“‘Work’ without author’ is a great Film about Germany – from Germany and for the world,” says Jan Mojto, has co-produced the Film. Perhaps this statement suggests, why “work without the author” don’t know to convince in its entirety. It is a Film that wants to tell too much. After a first screening at the Festival for journalists, there was only muted applause. You may be curious as to how the international audience “work without the author” in Venice accepts and how the Jury of the festival of Donnersmarck’s Film in the end will be the judge of that.