As usual, I know nothing but the title (and sometimes who's in it) of the films I'm gonna watch, not even genre, but with this one, I also saw the poster. These days, everything about movies is hugely predictive and spoilerish, so with a title like this, I could sense that it would be a drama, and quite frankly, because of the poster and the likeness of Hüller with Williams, I thought: Aha, some good American Indie drama.
Well, turns out I wasn't too far off, as this was definitely not some mainstream BS for the multiplexes.
Brownian Movement is a very slow study in the exposure of the dark side of a perfectly well adjusted (and I hate that phrase, well-adjusted, there's something terribly Nazi-Orwellian about it) successful medical doctor. The title refers to the phenomenon that molecules in fluids in states of rest still keep moving very slowly. To give you an impression of how slow the movie is, the first shot of the movie is a static shot of a very nice upscale apartment, about a minute long, which is long, if not an eternity, in this age of attention deficit disorders.
It's a film in three episodes and it opens with Charlotte, a very pretty Berlin medical doctor renting an apartment in Brussels, Belgium, the city where she works and lives with her husband, an architect, and their only child.
As it appears, Charlotte rented the apartment in order to have sex with other men, varying from the average to the highly unattractive and obese. Everything is OK, until Charlotte accidentally meets one of her lovers at her husbands place of work and she gets such a fit that she faints. In part two, she goes into therapy (for this?), sometimes even with her husband, while her precise condition is never clearly stated. Eventually, her medical license is revoked (which seems fascist to me, you can get your medical license revoked for sleeping around?? Or, it might be that some of her lovers were her patients as well), and in part three, she, her husband and son, and some new children (twins) are now living in India, where the film ends.
Brownian movement is an extremely understated movie, with sometimes breathtaking cinematography, comprised mostly of static shots. The only moving shots are when the camera is in a car. Otherwise, the film is rather like leafing through someones photo book, with only shots of Charlotte in it. This might be a weakness, the medium is after all, film aka "dem movin' pitchers", and it would be a good thing to have at least some attempt at panning (sweeping) camera shots. The acting, also by the underused Bakema is superb. And of course it's very pleasing to watch the very attractive Hüller, who really does look like Michelle Williams' almost twin sister.
Many things remain unclear, like who is Isaac, in what language do Charlotte and Max declare their love for one another after love making, (it's not English, French or German) and why does Charlotte sleep with all these rather ugly, gross looking men? I mean, obese hairy guy? WTF?
About that, it's nice that the movie doesn't attempt any explanations, other than Charlotte's remark that sleeping with those men and sleeping with her husband are two things which aren't related at all, and that giving an explanation would make things much worse. But it does make one curious. Then again, with movies like these, the room for discussion it leaves, will tell you much about the person you're going to see the movie with ....;)
The biggest question of the movie is, (and what I'm really curious about) if Michelle Williams knows that she has a German twin who is as good of an actress as she is, or better.
8/10 The Melancholic Alcoholic.
Well, turns out I wasn't too far off, as this was definitely not some mainstream BS for the multiplexes.
Brownian Movement is a very slow study in the exposure of the dark side of a perfectly well adjusted (and I hate that phrase, well-adjusted, there's something terribly Nazi-Orwellian about it) successful medical doctor. The title refers to the phenomenon that molecules in fluids in states of rest still keep moving very slowly. To give you an impression of how slow the movie is, the first shot of the movie is a static shot of a very nice upscale apartment, about a minute long, which is long, if not an eternity, in this age of attention deficit disorders.
It's a film in three episodes and it opens with Charlotte, a very pretty Berlin medical doctor renting an apartment in Brussels, Belgium, the city where she works and lives with her husband, an architect, and their only child.
As it appears, Charlotte rented the apartment in order to have sex with other men, varying from the average to the highly unattractive and obese. Everything is OK, until Charlotte accidentally meets one of her lovers at her husbands place of work and she gets such a fit that she faints. In part two, she goes into therapy (for this?), sometimes even with her husband, while her precise condition is never clearly stated. Eventually, her medical license is revoked (which seems fascist to me, you can get your medical license revoked for sleeping around?? Or, it might be that some of her lovers were her patients as well), and in part three, she, her husband and son, and some new children (twins) are now living in India, where the film ends.
Brownian movement is an extremely understated movie, with sometimes breathtaking cinematography, comprised mostly of static shots. The only moving shots are when the camera is in a car. Otherwise, the film is rather like leafing through someones photo book, with only shots of Charlotte in it. This might be a weakness, the medium is after all, film aka "dem movin' pitchers", and it would be a good thing to have at least some attempt at panning (sweeping) camera shots. The acting, also by the underused Bakema is superb. And of course it's very pleasing to watch the very attractive Hüller, who really does look like Michelle Williams' almost twin sister.
Many things remain unclear, like who is Isaac, in what language do Charlotte and Max declare their love for one another after love making, (it's not English, French or German) and why does Charlotte sleep with all these rather ugly, gross looking men? I mean, obese hairy guy? WTF?
About that, it's nice that the movie doesn't attempt any explanations, other than Charlotte's remark that sleeping with those men and sleeping with her husband are two things which aren't related at all, and that giving an explanation would make things much worse. But it does make one curious. Then again, with movies like these, the room for discussion it leaves, will tell you much about the person you're going to see the movie with ....;)
The biggest question of the movie is, (and what I'm really curious about) if Michelle Williams knows that she has a German twin who is as good of an actress as she is, or better.
8/10 The Melancholic Alcoholic.