Full Description
Bruno, a young German entomology student, travels to an Israeli kibbutz, but he is not seeking a romantic experience in the young Zionist state, nor will he make any scientific discoveries. Before her death, Bruno’s mother told him to deliver a letter to Avi, a German-born Jewish member of the kibbutz. Reluctantly, Avi shares his story with the young man. During the war, while fleeing to Switzerland to escape the Nazis, Avi was saved by the brutish, hard-working peasant Fritz, a man as remote as the mountains of the Black Forest he calls home. Against his wife Emma’s wishes, Fritz invites the Jew to hide and work at his farm. But Fritz has other things on his mind. He and his wife are unable to have children, and he proposes that Avi father a child with his wife. Inevitably, the erotically charged situation leads to unexpected complications. Spare but sumptuous cinematography captures the passion, desire and jealousy waiting to explode. This searingly intimate film will stay with you long after you leave the theater. The undeniable talents of director Franziska Schlotterer mark her as someone to watch; in her first narrative feature she has created an intense, nuanced examination of the awkwardness of human relationships.
