Berlinale: One of these days

My first film at the Berlinale this year was the premiere of the panorama film "one of these days". The next morning, I was once again standing in the queue at Kudamm to buy new tickets in advance. It was drizzling, and I thought about the film.

The film is about a competition: Twenty people stand around a car and touch the car with at least one hand. The last person standing wins the car. Basically, it's an advertisement for the car salesman on whose premises the competition takes place.

It's about how much you really want something. It's a little bit like waiting in line at the Kudamm. After ten minutes in the drizzle, one or the other person has left. In front of me there were two who took turns: one in the queue, the other under the rain roof. Others had chairs with them.

I had hoped for more from the film. A cinematic representation of waiting, an interior perspective with changed colours for example. Something about the motives to participate and about the occasions to give up. I had firmly expected the sentence: "It's only a car". Despite the two hours the director gave away a lot. In this respect, the film was a disappointment to me.

One character from the film comes into contact with his fear of not being enough for his beautiful wife and fails because of this fear. A fear I can well understand. The beautiful woman is played by Callie Hernandez and looks a little bit like the ticket seller at the box office at Kudamm, where I've been three times already and who has this glow in her eyes. Since it was the premiere of the film, some of the people involved in the film came on stage afterwards. Besides the beautiful Callie, I also noticed "The Notwist", a band I heard 25 years ago when I was at school. Nice to know they are still around.