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Film screening: Undine

Date

Schedule

18:00–19:30

Place

Garage Auditorium

DESCRIPTION

The Brandenburg Museum houses a model of Berlin, a city whose name derives from the Old Slavonic word for swamps and marshes. This is what visitors hear from museum guide Undine, who has two love affairs in this city, one after the other.

Berlin School director Christian Petzold’s recent film uses genre—in this case the romantic fairy tale—as a tool for critical analysis of reality.

Undine’s first lover, Johannes, breaks off their relationship, having failed to understand the depth of her feelings. The other is industrial diver Christoph, who she meets on a tour. Their awkward conversation turns out to be so passionate and intense that it explodes the aquarium standing nearby.

Christian Petzold is a leading figure of the Berlin School, which brought together several German directors, graduates of the Berlin Film and Television Academy, in the late 1990s and early 2000s. Their stories usually center around «small people”—migrants, clerks, teachers, and the middle class, whose explicitly calm life is filled with alienation, loneliness, and insecurity, the byproducts of neoliberal society and late capitalism.

Undine combines the principles of the sober, radically critical approach to reality inherent in Berlin School aesthetics with the ideas of classical romanticism—the triumph of the senses over reason and fatalism and a return to the mythological fundamentals of life. The protagonist is named after the mythical Undine, who, according to legend, is connected with the element of water and makes men fall in love with her in order to gain immortality. Petzold weaves magical realism and elements of a fairy tale into the psychologically motivated narration, with giant catfish swimming in the rivers of Berlin and heroes who reject love facing imminent death.

The film premiered internationally in the competition of the 70th Berlin Film Festival, with lead actress Paula Behr receiving the Silver Bear for Best Actress.

The film will be screened in German, English, and Spanish with Russian subtitles.

Undine
Dir. Christian Petzold
Germany, France, 2020. 91 min. 16+

TICKETS

Standard: 350 rubles
Student: 250 rubles*

BUY TICKETS

GARAGE cardholders: 175 RUB.

Tickets for seniors, veterans, large families, under 18s, and visitors with disabilities (with one carer): 175 RUB**
We recommend that you buy tickets in advance. All ticket categories are available online.

* Students aged 18–25 on production of relevant ID
** Please show proof of eligibility at the cinema entrance