Kino! ’15: Who Am I—No System in Safe

Considering the shadowy cyber-activist outfit known as FR13NDS decks out their avatars with masks clearly inspired by the terrorist protagonist of V for Vendetta, it is probably safe to assume the sanctity of life is not a big priority for them. However, a hero-worshipping hacker will be rather disappointed to learn they are in league with the Russian mob. Unfortunately, this revelation comes after he ever so ill-advisedly passes along some highly secretive intel. Cyber monkey-wrenching inevitably turns into cyber-terror in Baran bo Odar’s Who Am I—No System is Safe (trailer here), which screens as part of Kino! 2015, the festival of German Films in New York City.

Life has not worked out so well for Benjamin, at least so far. Yet, it always makes more sense when he is in front of a computer screen. Since he bought into the propaganda disseminated by FR13NDS, Benjamin has become one of the sycophants hanging on the pronouncements of the group’s shadowy leader, Mr. X, in super-secret online forums. He is not the only one. A chance meeting during court mandated community service with the mercurial Max will bring the two kindred spirits together. Together with Max’s old co-conspirators, they form CLAY (“Clowns Laughing At You”) in hopes of impressing Mr. X with their socially conscious prankersterism.

Much to the temperamental Max’s frustration, Mr. X remains dismissive of CLAY. Yearning for online approval, they swing for the fences, launching a major online and physical breach of the Federal intelligence service. Regrettably, when Benjamin gives Mr. X a batch of unvetted classified files as proof-of-hack, it leads to the gangland-style execution of government informants. Wanted for murder, CLAY will have to take down Mr. X to clear their names.

It might be awkwardly titled (“No system is safe” being one of Mr. X’s maxims), but WAI—NSIS is a massively slick thriller that offers a pointed critique of Vendetta and Hacktivist culture in general, while also slyly riffing on Fight Club. Odar’s inventive representations of cyberspace (in a dodgy looking subway car) are quite stylish and cinematic. He also stages some impressive breaking-and-entering scenes and seamlessly executes the third act mind-twister. Based on WAI—NSIS and his previous film, The Silence, it should not be long before Odar is recruited for a major American studio thriller gig.

The cast might have to wait longer for a call from Hollywood, but they are all reasonably solid. Tom Schilling (Generation War and A Coffee in Berlin) is suitably earnest and nebbish as Benjamin. Elyas M’Barek also vents some convincing spleen as the petulant Max, while Wotan Wilke Möhring and Antoine Monot Jr. add seasoning as their unlikely looking accomplices. On the other hand, it is difficult to fathom Hannah Herzsprung’s appeal as Marie, the charmless object of Benjamin’s affections.

Frankly, it is almost a miracle the production company behind WAI—NSIS has not been hacked back to the Stone Age by hacker-activists taking umbrage with the film’s relatively favorable depiction of law enforcement and decidedly critical portrayal of their online skulduggery. Arguably, it is one of the bravest films you will see all year. Highly recommended, Who Am I—No System is Safe screens this coming Monday (4/13) and Wednesday (4/15) at the Cinema Village, as part of this year’s Kino! in New York.

Kino! ’15: Schmitke

The shooshing of wind turbines should be felt more than heard, but that is not the case with a rusty hulk rattling away outside the provincial Czech town of Crimeleva. It never worked properly, but the German power company has finally dispatched an engineer to fix it. Since Julius Schmitke practically invented the model, he ought to be able to fix it. However, it might not be a purely mechanical problem that plagues the turbine in Stepan Altrichter’s Schmitke (trailer here), which screens as part of Kino! 2015, the festival of German Films in New York City.

Schmitke is temporarily on the outs with his boss and overdue for a midlife crisis, so he might as well be the one assigned to fixing the temperamental turbine. A quick break from the New Agey daughter recently returned from a commune will not kill him either. Unfortunately, he will have to take his incompetent hipster colleague Thomas Gruber along for the ride, but the world weary Schmitke can put up with a lot.

However, the turbine turns out to be a trickier case than Schmitke assumed. Strangely enough, fans in heating and ventilation units all over Crimeleva have a tendency to break down. A rationalist like Schmitke is not inclined to blame the legendary Marzebilla spirit that supposedly inhabits the woods. Nevertheless, Schmitke finds himself slowly sinking into some kind of rabbit hole when the useless Gruber inexplicably vanishes.

Schmitke is a devilishly hard film to classify, because it starts out as sort of a quiet observational film about the modest challenges faced by a mildly quirky late middle-aged fuddy-duddy in the tradition of Alexander Payne, but deliberately evolves into an ambiguously eerie David Lynch film. For the most part, Altrichter sticks to Twin Peaks territory, but he sort of loses the handle on the excessively Lynchian conclusion.

Just like nearly every film, Schmitke slightly overstays its welcome, but it is still worth getting lost in its clever and mysterious mid-section. Veteran German thesp Peter Kurth perfectly anchors the film as the rigidly rational Schmitke, who can hardly believe the weirdness unfolding around him. He nicely counterbalances the restrained lunacy of the assorted villagers, especially the mystical geologist Kryspin, played with manic relish by Peter Vrsek. Helena Dvoráková also makes quite the impression on Schmitke and on-screen as Julie Řeřichová, the sophisticated resort owner, whose last name is an unpronounceable Czech in-joke.

For long stretches, it is unclear just what sort of film Schmitke is and how weird it might ultimately get. In this case, that is rather cool. It is even odder for local German and Czech audiences, who might find the rustic Czech villagers reportedly speaking flawless German another strong indicator something is off here. In fact, there are many subtle call backs and hat tips that Altrichter chooses not to belabor. It is a very EU film, shot in German, by a Czech filmmaker, but there is no mistaking the Teutonic reserve of the title character. Strange but intriguingly low key, Schmitke is well worth experiencing when it screens this Sunday (4/12) and Wednesday (4/15) at the Cinema Village, as part of the 2015 edition of Kino! in New York.

Kino! ’15: The Lies of the Victors

Fabian Groys is a journalist and a compulsive gambler, so nobody should place their trust in him. Nevertheless, he will play the role of crusader for truth, when he is not pawning his Porsche to pay off gambling debts (evidently that is pretty easy to do in Germany). We are not supposed to find it suspicious this lefty journo drives such an expensive sports car either. All our mistrust should be reserved for the shadowy “them” in Christoph Hochhäusler’s The Lies of the Victors (trailer here), which screens as part of Kino! 2015, the festival of German Films in New York City.

In between binge drinking and losing his shirt at the craps tables, Groys has been working on an expose—something about German veterans from Afghanistan getting shunted into crummy jobs at a super-connected waste disposal facility. The details are about as hazy as his head and his Deep Throat source just bailed, for obvious reasons. However, he stumbles across a backdoor into the story when he has Nadja Koltes, the cute but naïve intern chase down some information on a vet who committed suicide by throwing himself into the local zoo’s lion habitat. Okay, that bit is pretty original, but guess where he worked.

Despite this rather damning revelation, the shadowy conspirators manage to manipulate Groys’ investigation. Eventually, Groys and Koltes land a cover story, but it is a rather toothless bit of moralizing compared to the muck-raking he originally intended. Unfortunately, once Groys realizes he has been played, it is dashed difficult to get un-played.

Since we see Groys inject his insulin within the first five minutes, everyone should know it is a lead pipe cinch there will be some sort of blood sugar misadventure before the film is out. Frankly, the entire film is like that. Many characters simply exist to represent the military, corporations, and media, with all the baggage that presumably entails. Arguably, Hochhäusler and co-writer Ulrich Peltzer are so concerned with scoring points, they lose sight of the narrative just as much as Groys does. Anyone who has been paying attention will wonder about obvious loose ends he and Koltes apparently forget about when they grind out their piece.

As Groys, Florian David Fitz admirably dives into the film, never shying away from the journalist’s self-absorbed nature and self-destructive tendencies. He also develops some believably ambiguous chemistry with Lilith Strangenberg’s Koltes. However, there are few legitimate characters to be found in the sprawling supporting ensemble, rather mostly just stock figures.

Lies is a stylish film, but not nearly as distinctive as Hochhäusler’s previous film, The City Below. While sharing certain thematic similarities, the prior film was also unusually intelligent and subtle. Neither are adjectives that easily fit Lies. Even the title, taken from a didactic Ferlinghetti quote, looks and sounds awkward. Very standard issue, The Lies of the Victors need not be a priority when it screens this Friday (4/10) and Saturday (4/11) at the Cinema Village, as part of this year’s Kino! in New York.

Kino! ’15: The Kings Surrender

On the one hand, you have the Sondereinsatzkommando (the SEK), the German version of SWAT. On the other, you have neighborhood punks, who are barely organized enough to be considered a gang. Yet, they are both as tribal as they can be. They have socialized together in a drunken brawling kind of way, but serious hostilities will flare when an outsider plants the wrong gun on the wrong innocent suspect in Philipp Leinemann’s The Kings Surrender (trailer here), which screens as part of Kino! 2015, the festival of German Films in New York City.

The SEK of an unnamed but clearly economically depressed German city are going through a rough patch. When raiding a drug dealer’s flat, an officer is badly shot. One of the presumed shooters gets away. This is particularly bad news for the SEK, because the local politicians are considering doing away with one of the squads, because the city is so obviously safe and secure. Bad press like this does not help. Nor does it lead to clear-headed decision-making by Kevin, the hot-headed squad leader.

Meanwhile, in a storyline soon to intersect with the SEK officers, charismatic Thorsten leads a group of local toughs that is nearly as much a social thing as it is a criminal enterprise. Let’s just say, they do a lot of drinking. For some reason, Nassim the son of an immigrant grocer idolizes Thorsten, despite being at least a full generation younger than his idol. To curry favor, Nassim arranges a job for Thorsten’s best bud Ioannis at his father’s store. Unfortunately, in a fit of juvenile jealousy, Nassim plants a gun he found in Ioannis’s locker and drops a dime with the cops. Yes, that would be the gun from before. Soon, both groups are caught up in a wave of vengeance-taking, while a few skeptical beat officers try to protect Ioannis from their more prominent colleagues.

Casting for Surrender probably included a mandatory swagger test. Yet, even with all the testosterone in the mix, the film’s vibe is more reminiscent of the moody thrillers of the 1970s that often featured moral ambiguous antiheroes and a preoccupation with institutional corruption. There is a lot of rottenness in Surrender, but there is no denying the gritty atmosphere and the power of the ensemble performances, particularly Ronald Zehrfeld as the unraveling Kevin and Samia Muriel Chancrin, as one of the few women characters of note—Nadine, the street cop who refuses to be intimidated by the SEK’s posturing.

Perhaps what most distinguished Surrender is the way it depicts the full spectrum of police corruption, from just a smidge to absolute crookedness, representing just about every point in between. You could assign each character a unique number value for their individual level of moral compromise. Unfortunately, Leinemann gives audience far more of Nassim’s adolescent angst than we really need, but otherwise it is quite a compelling, far reaching copper morality play. Recommended for fans of Sidney Lumet’s New York movies, The Kings Surrender screens this Friday (4/10) and Monday (4/13) at the Cinema Village, as part of this year’s Kino! in New York.