Soundless - Sans un bruit

This is a thoughtful film, rich in implication. It begins in a bedroom, which is being monitored by some police agency, we don't know who. They have the room bugged, and under camera surveillance, and a hit man still manages to do his job. We learn as the film goes on that this hit man is effective precisely because he studies his subjects, gets to know them so well that he can think like them. Deep sympathetic powers are the source of his deadly capabilities. This element is doubled in the cop assigned to stop him - another student of human nature, who uses observation and intuitive sympathy to predict the hit man's moves. Each of these characters is profoundly able to be intimate with the object of his quest. The development of the bond between the hit man and the woman he loves works out this theme of intimate knowledge and sympathy on a parallel plane. The psychological truth of this keeps us entranced by the film despite some elaborate technological machinations (the hit man's wall of fire, for example) that would normally defy credibility.

Lautlos is a movie from Tom Tykwer's film company, and you can see his influence as a producer in the sometimes dreamlike, introvert sequences. The film is about a serial killer who finds love and subsequently plans to quit his old underground life. Joachim Król plays the silent hitman very well, he gives a hint of broken softness to the character so that it's easy to like him. The plot is also exciting enough to keep your attention, with the right balance between action and character development. The only big problem about this movie are the dialogues. They are deliberately artificial but in such an exaggerated way that they just spoil the whole thing. Still, with the Król-bonus, it's a 7 out of 10 for me.

For everybody, who likes the shiny American action film, this truly might be a bit different. What I like especially about this "german action movie" is, that everything has a kind of normal color and sound. Nothing is overdone, overcoloured. What appears as boring compared with action movies with high pace like e.g. Bad Boys is the attempt of making it more realistic and not so shiny. The villain, for example, is not the typical bad guy, shootings don't try to "look or sound good" or the SEK (german S.W.A.T.) appears quietly and nearly invisible - like they should - without any of that heroic "fly-through-the-picture-shooting". The characters are also carefully designed to maintain this realistic approach, although the investigator in charge may be considered a bit weird. The killer, however, is as normal as can be - somebody you could meet on the street. Especially Joachim Krol, who's most famous appearance was in "Der bewegte Mann" (german comedy) surprised me with his totally different character.

All in all a film worth seeing, particularly while the story is different to all the action kind of movie you usually get.

The anti-hero of this dark and moody thriller is Viktor (Joachim Krol), a professional hit-man – and a very successful one at that. Maybe that's one reason he's called Viktor?

In this story, however, he's just completed a fairly standard hit and is now called upon to perform his finale – his most important hit for his mentor and paymaster, Martin Hinrich (Peter Fitz) – and that's when Viktor's life as a killer starts to unravel. Wouldn't you just know it?

But, it all comes apart in a most unexpected fashion. For example, when was the last time you saw a film where a hit-man saves the same person's life twice? In two days? Well, you guessed it: cherchez la femme! That fairly standard hit wasn't so normal, after all: Viktor was so smitten by the blonde, Nina (Nadja Uhl), in the bedroom of the guy he just popped on the patio that he lets her sleep on, instead of eliminating her as a witness!

Now, that could've been a big mistake, but the writer/director (Mennan Yapo)of this interesting romp turns that to Viktor's advantage after he saves her from drowning the next day: she's so distraught by the death of her one-night stand that she throws herself off a bridge. Viktor, who'd followed her, drags her out and calls for medical help – then fades into the background...

Because he has that final job to do for Martin, so he must leave romance aside until the job's done – or so he thinks. Trouble is, one smart copper, Lang (Christian Berkel) is hot on Viktor's trail. How? Well, he's very smart: he uses deductive logic, forensic evidence and large data banks – and maybe some je ne sais quoi - to hone in on the most likely suspects. Not as well done as Sherlock Holmes, perhaps, but still impressive. And, maybe just a little too easy for narrative purposes.

Meanwhile Viktor stays one step (or maybe two steps) ahead of Lang as he plans his hit on the target Martin wants dead; and it's no easy job, not this time. Compounding the scenario also is Viktor's inability to forget about Nina, whom he visits at her apartment and, well, eventually, the sparks fly as you might expect. He's falling for her, and it seems that Nina shares the feeling, although she still has doubts...

Which she wants to dispel by following Viktor as he leaves her apartment to do the job – the final hit.

What follows then is a very classy and richly ironic action sequence worthy of some of the best thrillers you're likely to see, and no more ridiculous than most. That part alone is worth seeing.

It's well produced, the acting is up to the task – with Krol the consummate taciturn loner, and making Matt Damon as Jason Bourne of the Bourne franchise look positively garrulous – the photography has enough action sequences, from long shot to extreme close-up, to satisfy most, and the music is, well, almost not even there. But, when it is there, you notice it; and it fits.

The film and story are nowhere near the prowess of Luc Besson, the late John Frankenheimer, Martin Scorsese and others. But, hey, all writer/directors start somewhere and this being Yapo's second effort, I'll make sure I see future efforts.

Interesting crime film that left me as confused at the end as I was at the beginning. Except for an undeveloped reference about a murder when the killer was nine years old, the film just doesn't give us enough information about a cold-blooded (but perfectionist) killer. It's too slick by half, although the visuals are quite stunning. One critic suggested that you're not supposed to examine this too closely -- just absorb what you see and enjoy it. Fair enough if that's good enough for you. I could not engage with the characters, who seem like they're seeking an author in a Pirandello play. The acting is first-rate, the forensics interesting (if you like that kind of procedural stuff), but in the end it lacked a solid story that made you want to care about Viktor, the silent, soundless killer.