Quotes

[on characters vanishing in his films] The vanishing allows me to talk about a void that many people suffer from, a void of meaning, of sense, of perspective in life. I feel there is something generally applicable there, that can tell something about life in the Western society. It gives me as well the possibility to examine individual identity. Where does it start, where does it end? Vanishing, though, is something very active, scarily active. In Die Vermissten (2012), I was interested in the generation gap. In Freedom (2017), apart from gender questions, it's more about the quest of freedom at large. Do we have it? Do we need it? Do we want it? The family serves as a micro-society here. [Aug.2017]

[on his guiding principles for directing Freedom (2017)] To be close to the actors, to be spontaneous, to have a very flexible camera work, hand held, impulsive. I wanted a very reduced team, documentary-like, I wanted colored lightning, so that we could transform the reality if we wished. I wanted to experiment with narration for a certain degree, to use elements, that you rarely see in fiction films, like the projections on people, to push back a little the boundaries of story-telling, to find some freedom there, too. I felt that there is no objective reality for Nora and Philip, but rather two worlds they each live in with little, but decisive connection. The truth would only be each character's individual perception of it. [Aug.2017]

[if he belongs to any young generation of German filmmakers] I can't say, it's something you can see much better from the outside. I pretty much work on my own, without many connections to other filmmakers. But there are films that try to question story-telling and form in a way I feel sympathetic about, like Victoria (2015) by Sebastian Schipper or Toni Erdmann (2016) by Maren Ade. These films prove that you can do something different - even risky - and yet reach an audience. And that's a spirit I like a lot. [Aug.2017]