The Edge of Heaven, its English title, a film by Faith Akin, explores the difficulty of human connection beset by geographical, political, but mostly human voids acting in random fashion which at the end, dramatize the advice of the philosopher, follow your bliss. The central characters, an old man and his son and a pair of mothers and their daughters, stumble through their lives in a struggle to realize their bliss in our age of rootlessness and political chaos. The only center in this is affection and its tenuous nature. It is the sole verity. While the film seems loosely constructed, it nicely balances the characters with the daughters at the center and the others, despite the powerful presence of Hanna Schygulla, in a secondary role. Indeed it is the daughters Nurgül Yesilçay as Ayten and Patrycia Ziolkowska as Lotte that are at the emotional center of the film and it only becomes alive when they are on screen. Indeed their sulfurous embrace in a crowded, smoky club was breathtaking.
Review of The Edge of Heaven
