Aïnouz directed the Chicago Film Festival Gold Hugo 1st
Place prize winner MADAME SATÃ in 2002, a film with one of the
best closing credit sequences of any film seen that year, while
this has one of the most brilliant opening sequences, set to bright colors and
the reckless punk sounds of Suicide
- Ghost Rider (1977) - YouTube (2:34), where a pair of German motorcycle
riders traverse a Brazilian beachfront landscape of giant sand dunes, racing
across the crowded beach, throwing off their clothes and rushing into the
ocean. Only one survives, however, as
the other gets caught in the ferocious riptides, where the desperate attempts
by lifeguard Donato (Wagner Moura) fail to save the drowning man. Told in three chapters, opening with The Drowner's Embrace, the film has a
stark beauty in the gorgeous outdoor cinematography by Ali Olay Gözkaya featuring
the spectacular allure of one of the best Brazilian beaches in the Northeastern
region of Fortaleza,
noted for their high winds, making it especially dangerous, capturing the long
expanse of pristine coastline filled with swimmers, lounge chairs, kiosks,
restaurants, showers, and casual beach lounges, offering bits of insight into
the beach culture through a series of group calisthenics exercises performed in
the sand and ocean by the lifeguards, reminiscent of the body sculpture and poetic
grace of Claire Denis in Beau
Travail (1999). Donato has a close
relationship with his mother and adoring little brother Ayrton who loves to
imagine himself as a super hero, going through the moves, playing imaginary
games on the beach with his big brother.
Heavy with guilt, still shaken from the experience of his first death
while on patrol, Donato meets with the survivor, Konrad (Clemens Schick), a
former soldier who owns a motorcycle repair shop in Berlin, where their grief
is shared through robust sexual interludes, spending their days together
searching for the missing body. The pace
of the film slows considerably as the days grow longer and more frustrating
when the body can’t be found. When the
search is eventually called off, they both find it difficult to let go of one
another when Konrad returns home.
In the second chapter, A
Hero Cut in Half, Donato makes a decision to visit Konrad in the middle of
a dreary winter in Germany,
leaving behind his beloved beach, believing he could never live anywhere
without it. The guys pick up where they
left off, continuing their affair in Berlin, dancing to Christophe’s “Aline” Praia do Futuro - Aline (cena
completa) YouTube (2:27), or in crowded gay nightclubs, Praia do Futuro YouTube (2:21), where Konrad tries
to make him feel welcome, but it’s clear Donato is out of his element living in
a country that is alien to him. The
distance is reflected in long, wordless sequences where the audience grows
acclimated to being in a culture speaking a foreign tongue, where you’re
automatically separated from each and every person on the landscape. In contrast to such a highly appealing,
bright and sunny locale of Brazil,
Germany couldn’t
be more drab and gloomy, existing in a colorless void. Despite the obvious isolation, it seems to
heighten the other senses, as the sensual nature of the filmmaking turns this
into an abstract expression of gentle sensations and absorbing ambiance,
flirting with the idea of staying permanently, going all in, giving up what
matters the most to him, where any decision to stay would have a protracted
emotional and psychological price. Jumping
forward eight years, the chapter title says it all, A German Speaking Ghost, where Donato’s new ocean is an enclosed
city aquarium where he works as a maintenance diver, seen swimming alone in an
empty indoor pool, where he and Konrad are no longer together, but remain close
friends. Their lives are uprooted with
the sudden arrival of Ayrton (Jesuíta Barbosa), who arrives angry and
unannounced, seen initially making his way anonymously on the streets, finding
his way around, exploring the big city on his own, picking up a wayward girl
named Dakota (Sophie Charlotte Conrad) before releasing her to the winds.
This final section is perhaps the most disjointed, as it’s a
case of lost connections, as Ayrton reports their mother died and they hadn’t
heard from him in all this time, where Donato left one day and simply
disappeared off the face of the earth.
All three have lost something vital and significant in their lives, where
romance ebbs and flows, leaving an irreparable hole in their hearts, where
Aïnouz resorts to sparse dialogue and an elegant expression of stylish
imagery. While it can be sexually
explicit, ultimately the film is more about cultural dislocation and the
remembrance of love, showing the elasticity of boundaries, both personal and
geographic, and the effect distance has on relationships. The authenticity of the ups and downs of the
relationship couldn’t be more natural, elegantly scripted and especially well
acted, reminiscent of Andrew Haigh’s Weekend
(2011), as both are among the better portrayals of an adult gay
relationship. Aïnouz is a Brazilian who
has now settled in Germany, paying a debt to Wim Wenders and the existential
haze of The
American Friend (Der amerikanische Freund) (1977), turning this final
section into a melancholic road movie, where all three find themselves in
different states of mind when they hit the road on their motorbikes, seemingly
with no destination in mind, though they initially end up at the ocean in the
desolation of a grey wintry landscape, as if stuck inside a cloud bank, desolate
souls in search of their better selves, where the men struggle to find some
form of reconciliation and mutual understanding, layered in a tender piano
score by Volker Bertelmann. It’s curious
how different the three sections are both emotionally and cinematically, where
the surging energy and youthful vibrancy of the opening gives way to emotive
textures as an impressionistic and visually seductive mood supersedes
narrative, where the wandering aimlessness of the finale takes on a poetic
resonance as they ride into the foggy abyss of a German Autobahn to the
sound of David Bowie and Brian Eno singing “Heroes” in both German and English,
David Bowie, Heroes.1978 YouTube (6:24).
