Das letzte Schweigen

'The Silence' is a dour, multi-perspective thriller, telling the story of a murder investigation and its links to another killing twenty years before. The film effectively conveys a strong sense of a contemporary German environment, making the mundane seem very particular, but somehow the whole thing doesn't quite gel: there are too many points of view to make the viewer care about any one, and the mystery depends on an unlikely motive, with a deliberately inscrutable ending. For me the real problem came in the scene where two policemen fight over the hunch that one of them has: it's just not convincing that either of them would care so much. It's a rare case, in my opinion, of a movie that might have benefited from just a little Hollywood showmanship.

Most murders are committed by people who know their victim, a fact that is standard fare in most whodunits. Rarely are murders committed at random, although the recent horrific thriller Funny Games (1997, remade 2007) presents the worst possible scenario.

But random murders do occur in real life: all over the world, people disappear and forever remain 'dead' with family and friends who are forever in limbo, unable to achieve closure. Only sometimes are the perpetrators caught.

With that thematic background, The Silence presents just that scenario with the rape and murder of a young female teen that remains on the books of the local police for 23 years – until it happens again to another teen, on the same day of the year, at the same place, and with the same modus operandi.

Unlike other serial killer movies – for example, The Silence of the Lambs (1991) – we know the identity of the killer from the get-go. Moreover, we also immediately know there are two perpetrators, although one of them is obviously reluctant to participate, even passively as he watches. As the two criminals, Ulrich Thomsen (as Peer Sommer) and Woltan Mohring (as Timo Friedrich) give strong and believable performances that center upon their individual but similar proclivities for depravity: brave actors both to take on such abhorrent roles.

But why a gap of 23 years? Well, that's where the story really starts, after we see the first murder in the first five minutes. And when the second murder occurs, so also occurs the retirement party for the local police detective (Krischan Mittich played by Burghart Klaussner) who failed to solve the first; so also the return to duty of an eccentric, grieving, widowed officer (David Jahn played by Sebastian Blomberg) who is obviously still distraught by the loss of his wife (to cancer) and who engages in bizarre activity; and so also the emotional awakening of the mother of the first murdered teen (Elena Lange played by Katrin Sass), who has been locked in unrelenting grief for over twenty years.

And in that mix there is repressed and introverted Timo – now a successful architect, beautiful home, lovely wife, two munchkins, the works – who, when he reads about the second murder, knows immediately who it is and decides something must be done… But, what?

As the police investigate, and as the clues are revealed, the net – so to speak – tightens without the two miscreants knowing. But, as viewers, we know it all, and gradually we move to the edge of our seat as we see how the wrong decisions are made, how the wrong inferences are drawn, how actions by one can be misconstrued by another all too easily, and ultimately how facts can be ignored or discarded for political expediency or professional jealousy and for the need to close a case, once and for all.

Arguably, suspenseful story doesn't get much better than this; although some viewers might argue about narrative holes and coincidence. However, because it's so believable it's so much better, especially the ending which I'm sure many – maybe most – viewers will not see coming, including me. Only in the last thirty seconds, perhaps… when the full irony hits you between the eyes.

The setting is semi-rural, ordinary and faultless; the production is well paced, even at two hours; the dramatic acting – there is absolutely no comic relief – is flawless; and the direction is so good, well, a glance or look truly is more effective than a thousand words. The background music is appropriate but, at times, borders on clichéd, I think. However, this is a movie I'll watch again – not only for the story but also for the narrative structure that combines so many different threads of lives shattered by indifference, inaction, inadequacy or inconsolable sadness.

Highly recommended.

November 2011.

I had two films to review which actually are quite similar.

One is this Das letzte Schweigen, The Silence, and the other one which is from Belgium is called The Treatment.

Both films are excellent thrillers European style, which is slower, more surgical the their Hollywood counterparts if you wish, being The Treatment a little bit more dynamic in terms of pace but not that much really.

These movies are sometimes hard or even painful to watch because they deal with a very disturbing matter which is the children sexual abuse by adults mostly men, pedophiles, sexual predators filling the worst space possible in terms of sexually oriented mental illness, and I say this because despite our feelings for these monsters, (they are people truly sick, they can not help themselves, to the point that many of them want to be castrated or even executed because of the remorse and the guilt) are truly hard, particularly people like me with kids of our own.

This film is made almost documentary like, it brings to mind John Mc Naughton's Henry, portrait of a serial killer with the great performance by MIchael Rooker, being that character a guy in a murderous rampage not only with kids but everyone who get close.

Great acting of the whole cast, with Ulrich Thomsen who is mostly known for the american TV show Banshee, which is full of violence, sex, crime and there Thomsen shines as the former Amish crime boss as one of the two deranged sexual abusers here.

I'm not going to say anything to spoil this movie. Just that it's very well made, disturbing trough and through and from start to finish this is not your typical pop corn thriller but a study of extremely sick people, dark, depressing and showing you that monsters are out there for real and many of them are there to stay.

I'm not getting into technical aspects because in that field the film is correctly made but in my opinion the story and how this is told is the important thing.

Really a serious take no prisoners thriller if you are not afraid of real life nightmares.

THE SILENCE is a German murder mystery that's heavily indebted to two separate sources: firstly, the whole look and mood of the currently-popular Scandinavian cop shows (such as THE KILLING), from which the style of music is frequently ripped off (like that whole thing with a single, deep note held for a while). Meanwhile, the plot and police investigation bear more than a hint of the exceptional South Korean drama, MEMORIES OF MURDER.

What follows is predictable but occasionally highly gripping, and strangely enough different sub-plots in the movie have different levels of interest. I admit that I found the whole police investigation to be pretty dull; there isn't actually much investigating taking place, and it all seems very slow and stately. The scenes of grieving parents are so familiar by now that they didn't affect me at all.

A second, alternate part of the film follows the friendship between two men, one of whom is a paedophile and murderer. This part of the film is exceptionally, dealing with dodgy subject matter in an intensely gripping way. Ulrich Thomsen (from THE THING remake) and Wotan Wilke Mohring are both very good here, and I would have much preferred the whole film to concentrate on these two by doing away with the predictable police stuff altogether. However, what we're left with is a real film of two halves; one's powerful stuff indeed, and the other's best forgotten.

In 1986, an 11 year old girl Pia is raped and murdered in a wheat field near a small German town by one man while another watched. Her bicycle was left in the field and the killer was never found. The man who watched takes off after the murder. Twenty three years later, 13 year old Sinikka Weghamm goes missing after the local fair. Her bicycle is found at the site of Pia murder.

This is another dark psychological crime thriller. It is a good representation of the ugliness amidst the normal everyday society. The dark subject matter is normal for these types of movies nowadays. It would be shocking 20 years ago. Today, it's on network TV. The actors do a fine depicting these characters under stress. It remains intriguing until the end.