A masterclass in an ethereal and annoying shine

One is the most lonely number of the superb second feature of Mascha Schilinsky, a fractured reflection on childhood and family which avoids the linear story for the immersive atmosphere, telling the story of four young girls of different eras whose life takes place, according to Harry Nilserson, by making yesterdays. Cinema is a word too small for what this sprawling but intimate epic realizes in its ethereal and annoying shine; Forget Cannes, forget about competition, forget all year round, even …Sound to fall is an all-time.

The only constant in a kaleidoscopic chronology which takes place over a hundred years is a farm in the north of Germany, established in the opening scenes – perhaps in the 1930s or 40s – as Erika’s house (Lea Drinda), which has fun linking its slight left and walking on the crutches of its uncle Fritz. Fritz, an amputee, is largely worded and suffers from night terrors, a victim of the First World War, but not the way you might think. So far, everything is quite traditional, like any other well -appointed period drama. Things suddenly take a bizarre tour, however, when Erika seems to break the character, look in the camera – and smiling.

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From there, we return to a time when Little Alma (Hanna Heckt) lived there with her sisters. Nothing is explained, but of their dress, it seems that it was the beginning of the 20th century, perhaps during the first world war. Alma’s mother is organizing a party for the whole day of the soul and released a special black dress for her youngest girl to wear. The chimney is full of photographs of deceased parents, but one in particular stands out: the body of a little girl, wedged on a sofa with a doll. It is a macabre table, even more foreign by a frightening double exposure that transforms the woman behind her (is it Alma’s mother?) In a type of faceless ectoplasm.

The little girl looks like Alma, and her sisters tell her that East her. But how can it be? This is the first of many mysteries, the most likely explanation being that, taking into account the high infant mortality rate of time and the haunting image of a little boy in a recuuric coffin, Alma’s mother lost more than one child along the way. But while Alma is thinking about this, the film moves to the attention to the present day, where Lenka (Laeni Geiseler) and his little sister Nelly (Zoë Baier) live with their parents. The farm is now something of a superior fixer, and we can say from the horribly dated decor that the place has not had much love since the Cold War. This is our signal for another time shift; The following period is an indefinite post-war period when we meet Angelika (Lena Urzendowsky), Erika’s niece.

From there, Schilinsky engages in a type of strange but effective hypnosis, showing the life cycle of a family home through the eyes of young girls who lived there. The sentences and situations are repeated at different periods and, in the most daring strategy of all, the voices OFF of the girls – as if we were talking beyond the grave – do not always count with what we see. Memory, like time, is an abstract concept here, and the agitated camera of Fabian Gamper has a ghost presence, always observing and yet never completely told, sometimes pulling in such a small day that it is difficult to see what is happening in darkness.

Given the subject, death is everywhere – a fairly fair reflection of the morbid inner life of young girls still drawn, such as butterflies, books like The bell jar and films like The notebook – But what is real and what is imagined is left so that the spectator decides (Angelika, in particular, divides a devastating end for itself in a cornfield). An obvious comparison is Sofia Coppola’s first film Virgin suicidesAnd we can also plead in favor of the enigmatic of Peter Weir Hanging rock picnicWhich is much closer to mind. But Schilinsky’s film is absolutely his own beast, this rare film that has no music, except for an surprisingly wonderful song (“Stranger” by Anna von Hausswolff), based rather on a mixture of ambient clicks and buzzing which give the film an analog quality with a small fixed which adapts perfectly with its prourtis themes Last times.

A visualization might not be sufficient, two will certainly make things a little clearer, but Sound to fall – Like its bad mood title – is not a puzzle that awaits to be resolved. Instead, it is an exhilarating experience, sometimes frustrating, but in a most difficult and most difficult way. If Terence Davis and David Lynch made a film together, it would look like this. Frankly, there are no higher praise than that.

Title: Sound to fall
Festival: Cannes (competition)
Director: Mascha Schilinsky
Scriptwriters: Mascha Schilinsky, Louise Peter
Casting: Hanna Heckt, Lea Drinda, Lena Urzendowsky, Laeni Geiseler, Zoë Baier, Luise Heyer, Susanne Wuest
Sales agent: MK2
Operating time: 2 h 29 min