🎬 #140 Trouble's All That's Found.
There is a certain element of The Observer Effect in the two films this week. This is a principle in science that says that the act of observing something necessarily changes it. It’s tricky to be objective. Mysteries and thrillers are kind of predicated on this idea - that the more you look into something, the more things change, the more entangled you become with the subject and the more obsession takes hold.
All of this can skew the perspective of the investigator - making them see something that isn’t necessarily objective reality. They begin to complete the picture they were once only observing.
Happy choosing, happy viewing
Bry
FILM ONE: THE LIVES OF OTHERS
2006 Dir Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck
2 hrs 17 mins
Set during the 80’s when the Berlin Wall was still standing - the film follows Stasi secret police captain, code name HGW XX/7, as he’s asked to surveil quite a prominent playwright’s home. The fact that the playwright is a model East German citizen makes the agent wonder why he was given such a task. But slowly and surely the motivation behind the surveillance is revealed.
What follows is a gripping portrait of trying to make good decisions in bad circumstances. A test of how far you should intervene in a situation that will make you an outcast. The pacing of the action is beautiful, the performances are tight, the plot pin point perfect. Relax into a detail orientated story of a man torn between ideology and humanity.
TL;DR: Von Donnersmarck’s film is a story of beautifully intense economy with a powerful pay off.
*Available for a small rental fee on Amazon and Apple in the US and Sky Store in the UK.
Fact: This was the first feature film made by the director.
FILM TWO: REAR WINDOW
1954 Dir Alfred Hitchcock
1 hr 52 mins
Another film that’s even more devastatingly economic is Hitchcock’s rear window. A photographer, forced to rest after breaking his leg, becomes obsessed with watching his neighbours with his telephoto lens - until he suspects one of them might have committed murder. We’re right with L.B - played by James Stewart - observing as he is, seeing the narratives that his gaze puts onto the people he barely knows.
With remarkable efficiency, Hitchcock weaves a thriller that’s as gripping as even the largest globe-spanning epic. The simplicity of the vantage point and the theatre-like layout of the neighbouring apartments makes us feel as obsessed as he is. After seeing it again, you can’t help but look out and make up stories out of the patterns of everyday life.
TL;DR: Hitchcock’s classic deserves to be revisited for how good a film it is, from so little.
*Available for a small rental fee on Amazon and Apple in the US and also on Netflix in the UK.
Fact: The film was shot in one month, remarkably quick.