And Tomorrow the Entire World

The movie captured some media interest in Germany when it was screened in Venice film festival but was also critisised by leftists focussing on the childish and psychotic behaviour of the antifascist group. So I was at least curious. Well, the movie doesn't live up to expectations. The story is a bit dull and I had a hard time to follow it. Shooting and edit is not bad but the visual side also failed to hold up my interest. On the positive side I think the acting is at least authentic and the movie lacks the usual dose of policial indoctrination.

Very often people forget that movies could and should be two separate things. Some are entertainment, pure and simple, and some are art, trying to tell a story or make a statement about the world around us. It usually isn't that difficult to figure out what kind of a movie we want to watch. Even so, too often viewers who despair to be entertained at any cost complain about art movies. They are slow, boring, blah, blah, blah... That is always unfair and we and only we have a final decision what to watch. So, this is an art movie, raw and unraveling like the relentless passion of youth. Jerky camera moves, gray streets of an industrial city, innocent idealism that turns dark and dangerous. Fighting evil is a filthy business, nobody comes out of it unscathed. Perhaps that's the reason why there are so many onlookers and collaborators. Fear and cowardice, the twins of failure and missed opportunities.

A mediocre and overall fairly disappointing movie due to weak plot and overall message, mediocre direction, slow clunky pacing, and a very predictable cliched ending. There are some redeeming qualities though such as acting, music, production values, cinematography, and some cool (despite being thinly executed) ideas here & there. It's certainly watchable and all, but don't get too excited about this one.

The leftists are routinely portrayed as idealistics and somewhat naives. The director, despite her own experience, does not avoid this portrait, although it focuses on the well-known friction between fighting with the same weapons as the enemy, about turning into a wolf to face the wolf. "If it had been done in 1930, Nazism would not have existed." That is a good justification. But showing left-wing extremists as immature and naive makes the debate too simplistic.

This.film has so much potential and fails on so many levels that it is really sad to watch. A lost effort. Two stars for occasional Olivier Assays style editing that unfortunately does not help patch up lack of motivation in characters and lack of story development.