Forget everything in connection with the plot or the story of this film. It is bizarre in a forced way and presented most unconvincingly. Obviously, the plot was only a basis for director and co-writer Peter Lichtefeld that gave him the opportunity to convey a certain feeling of melancholy. And this he managed excellently.
Personally, I share his fascination for everything that has to do with trains. So I was quite an appreciative audience for his movie. But I think, Lichtefeld also generally transmits that wonderful roadmovie atmosphere of long and arduous journeys, especially in trains, and by including myths of the Inari lake (the place where the main character heads to) on the one hand and a completely unmotivated crime mystery on the other hand, he even manages to create suspense and fidgety excitement. You get a notion that something great is behind all this, although, to be honest, there isn't. Zugvögel is a film for romantic dreamers (and for train fans like me). It is not a thoughtful reflexion of the arduous ways of our lives, or so.
The actors are well chosen: Joachim Król is Germany's melancholy man number one. Outi Mäenpää is exotic enough to tear him out of his apathy (although we never know what exactly it is that attracts them to each other). Peter Lohmeyer plays the thoughtful detective that uses the psychological approach to find the wrong criminal. And *** SPOILER! SPOILER! SPOILER! *** Nina Petri is a secretary so erotically rakish from the start that, of course, she turns out to be the real killer in the end *** END OF SPOILER ***.
I had hoped to see a little more of the picturesque Finnish landscape. Instead, I got pictures of trains and people in trains, and I chose to like it. Either you buy Zugvögel on videotape or you let it fall into oblivion.
Personally, I share his fascination for everything that has to do with trains. So I was quite an appreciative audience for his movie. But I think, Lichtefeld also generally transmits that wonderful roadmovie atmosphere of long and arduous journeys, especially in trains, and by including myths of the Inari lake (the place where the main character heads to) on the one hand and a completely unmotivated crime mystery on the other hand, he even manages to create suspense and fidgety excitement. You get a notion that something great is behind all this, although, to be honest, there isn't. Zugvögel is a film for romantic dreamers (and for train fans like me). It is not a thoughtful reflexion of the arduous ways of our lives, or so.
The actors are well chosen: Joachim Król is Germany's melancholy man number one. Outi Mäenpää is exotic enough to tear him out of his apathy (although we never know what exactly it is that attracts them to each other). Peter Lohmeyer plays the thoughtful detective that uses the psychological approach to find the wrong criminal. And *** SPOILER! SPOILER! SPOILER! *** Nina Petri is a secretary so erotically rakish from the start that, of course, she turns out to be the real killer in the end *** END OF SPOILER ***.
I had hoped to see a little more of the picturesque Finnish landscape. Instead, I got pictures of trains and people in trains, and I chose to like it. Either you buy Zugvögel on videotape or you let it fall into oblivion.