Victoria

Film as a performance and it's up to you how you take the ending. Unlike the others, I am instead convinced that the one-take method here is closely intertwined with the content, which simply wouldn't work without it. The genius loci of early Berlin, where anything goes, plays one of the main roles here; those who have ever drunkenly and drugged their way through the morning big city will particularly appreciate the immediacy of the first half of the film, which otherwise functions as a notoriously overwrought introduction to the narrative and characters. In a clever move, I find that the non-native speakers communicate with each other in broken English, which paradoxically simplifies their communication with the viewer, which is always limited to cutely futile bare sentences and not burdened with superstructure. Which can generally be applied to the whole film. The problem, paradoxically, arises once the plot gets going, when many imbecilic decisions can no longer be excused by adrenaline, alcohol, and drugs, but instead increase in intensity and, thanks to a narrative in real time, we drink in their consequences throughout. The uncomfortable tension that otherwise makes the whole film a veritable festival of viewer discomfort is thus transformed into a relentless facepalm and gnashing of teeth, as the one-take method is now becoming ossified and continues to lack formal attraction. It's only there, and it's only for one take. Nothing more (nothing less). P.S. For a woman who unsuccessfully went to pee at the beginning of the film, Victoria ended up making it through the next two and a half hours just fine. I had always suspected during my school days that girls go to the bathroom partly out of boredom. (21/02/2016)

This is a triumph of form over content. Hats off to the creativity and all the preparations that had to precede making this movie to make it all come together in one coherent continuous shot. Unfortunately, what makes this movie incredibly underwhelming is the behaviour of characters, who make the most stupid decisions possible just to give some direction to the melodrama. Plus, since the movie makes it so the audience is locked in with these idiots for a full one-hundred and forty minutes, the audience is then fully able to feel the effects of both their incomprehensible actions and the unnecessarily overlong running time more intensely. (28/10/2021)

I probably didn’t get the film’s message, hence the low rating. When I found out it had over 70%, my jaw dropped so low it almost broke my toe. From my point of view, it’s a movie about a stupid girl, who after leaving a nightclub joins four drunk Germans. When they don't gangrape her within the first five minutes, she’s so thrilled that she joins them in a robbery and child kidnapping. The movie would be too short, so the filmmakers shrewdly filled it with pointlessly long scenes in which nothing happens. I don’t see any point in philosophizing about the influence of disco music on the development of characters, so this is the end of my review. (22/11/2016)

The film definitely has a good pace and the characters are quite intense, plus it develops maybe a little differently than you expect at first glance. It's a ride, almost in real time, with an interesting camera and interesting editing. However, it didn't manage to engage me in a way that I would outright admire the film. (15/06/2017)

(BE2CAN, Lucerna) A very intensive experience, likeable characters, a high degree of credibility and form that leaves you flabbergasted. For me, by far the best of this year’s Be2Can: it wasn’t too brooding, didn’t have any snobbish answer to existential questions, it even had a plot! And it got an applause, wow! (18/10/2015)