The Silence (2010)

Why so much hype?

If you don't like this, we can't be friends.

The film's masterful storytelling did its job. The message was clear. No need to overdo.

There's no way I can possibly love it entirely but I just think its ridiculously bad, but enjoyable at the same time.

Talking to a family friend over the weekend,I found out that he had caught the ending of a wonderful sounding Neo-Noir from Germany on BBC4.Taking a look on BBC iPlayer,I was pleased to find that the title would be kept on for a week,which led to me getting ready to find out how silent things could be.The plot:1986:Driving round, Peer Sommer and Timo Friedrich spot 11 year old Pia riding her bike home.Whilst Friedrich sits in the car,Sommer gets out to rape and kill her.After witnessing the act,Friedrich disappears from Sommer's life,as police officer Krischan Mittich tries (and fails) to find much evidence over who the murderer might be.23 Years later:Shortly before the anniversary of Pia's death,missing 13 year old Sinikka Weghamm's bike is found at the spot where Pia was killed. Grieving over the death of his wife,police officer David Jahn is given the task of finding missing Sinikka Weghamm.During his investigation into where Weghamm is,Jahn begins to break the silences on a similar unsolved missing person/murder case that took place 23 years ago.View on the film:Making his (feature) film debut,writer/director Baran bo Odar reveals that the best way to make an entrance is not with a bang,but a sinister,silent scream.Opening up Pia's murder in flashbacks,Odar and cinematographer Nikolaus Summerer soak the movie in an evil under the sun Neo-Noir atmosphere,where the sun-kissed fields and neatly cut parks are a cover for the foreboding "ghosts" and blood covered hands which have not faded over the passage of time.Placing everything on a knife edge, Odar digs into a rich Neo-Noir mood by pulling Pas de Deux great score back,and treading on the stench of death on Friedrich,by brilliantly lingering on Friedrich pass a comfortable point,and also subtly placing a wide "gap" between Friedrich and everyone he meets. Taken from the pages of Jan Costin Wagner's novel,the screenplay by Odar makes sure to not approach the killers in an apologetic manner,with Odar instead making sure that Friedrich's lingering memories of death are always bubbling just under the surface.Suspecting a link between the two murders, Odar makes Jahn's search for the links one that brings up no easy answers,from former lead cop Mittich putting a brick wall up against any of Jahn's ideas,to Odar bringing up the silences to deliver a devastating Neo-Noir final note,as Jahn discovers that his fellow cops are more interested in putting a false bow of hope on the Neo- Noir doubts,and not breaking the deadly silence.

There were moments when I felt a connection between this film and SE7EN (1995), but that didn't prevail. When it was over, I realized only one other film had so adeptly hit the same marks - M (1931). There is a brilliance in character insight here, rarely paralleled in cinema. You're aware of the innermost turmoils of every character, and it is scripted in such a way that there are moments when you're being hit with intense turmoil from upwards of 4-5 characters at once. Each in a different brief scene, each privately (so only the audience and that character know what they're feeling) and each adding to the complexity of what the others are going through by juxtaposition. Smart, smart, smart. Saw this on NetFlix. I doubt I would've found it otherwise. I will be ordering it. Who says digital content is hurting the movies? I just voted with my money, but not for Hollywood.

The realism draws you in and the pacing keeps you hooked. It was more immersive for me because I did not know any of the actors in the film.This was not a documentary style crime story or a pure police procedural. There was enough of that to satisfy but it was not the focus.Almost every scene is about loss or loneliness, but it is really not about depression but more regrets in life. With each character is it different but it all flows together. SPOILER: Even the "solving" of the crime was a loss because justice as not fully done.There were no stereotypical characters except the bald headed police chief who was always wrong. Having the characters act like real people made it difficult to predict exactly the plot.See this film. It is now on netflix.

Heralded as a German rival for "The Killing", I expected more from this still unsettling subtitled crime drama. Centring on two identical murders some 23 years apart, while we're clearly shown the perpetrator of the first murder, the identity of the second slayer is kept from us until close to the end, but isn't difficult to work out. The film I suspect fancies itself more as a psychological analyses of disturbed individuals rather than a more conventional murder mystery, but fails largely due to inconsistencies in the writing especially the numerous unlikely alliances made by various parties in the narrative. There's an awful lot of pairing which goes on, on all sides of the fence but many seem too unrealistic and unnatural to convince, especially the key one involving the murderer and his abettor but also the disturbed, recently widowed detective and his obviously pregnant partner not to mention the retired but still rebellious detective from te first murder landing up in the bed of the first victim's mother. I especially didn't get the heart-on his-sleeve widower detective who resembles a slightly deranged Daniel Day Lewis and who seemingly is given largesse by his superior to openly question and indeed harangue the latter's orders but who of course cracks the case with an observation I got to before he did himself. The film dwells at length on the grief processes of sundry parties to the extent that you feel it forgets it should primarily be dealing with the emotive subject of child-murder. Also I am fast growing tired of those several aerial-perspective tracker shots plus I felt just too many scenes were unlikely not to mention unbelievable. I want greatly struck by the acting either so that in the end it just came across to me as an over-earnest, over-ambitious but ultimately over-dull police-procedural