Austria | Germany 2014
Starts February 13, 2014
Director: Andreas Prochaska
Writing credits: Martin Ambrosch, Andreas Prochaska
Cast: Sam Riley, Paula Beer, Tobias Moretti
Length: 115 minutes
A lone Texan cowboy rides his horse through a valley. A large cowboy hat overshadows his face. He is silent. He leads a pack horse which carries his gear. The destination is an isolated village deep in the mountains. The villagers greet him hesitantly and provide him with a room in the house of a widow and her daughter Luzi. The cowboy hides his Winchester rifle in the barn. But wait! People are speaking in an Austrian dialect. True: the cowboy is from Texas, but he also speaks Austrian, albeit with an American accent. Director Prochaska has created a beautiful western movie in the mountains of Austria and, where you expect to see Gary Cooper or Clint Eastwood, there is a wonderful Sam Riley as Greider. The Brenner family has complete control over the village. There is the father – a real Godfather type. There are his six sons Hans, Hubert, Otto, Rudolf, Luis and Edi, each one more stupidly aggressive than the other. Everyone is related to them due to an ancient custom that allows the Brenners first jump on any bride immediately after the wedding. And that’s why Greider has undertaken the long trek from Texas: his mother experienced a similar fate, but then escaped to the U.S.
The story unfolds slowly in a beautiful natural habitat, where violence would normally be an anachronism. Low thunder rolls in the hills; the metronome ticks; then snow cuts off all outside civilization. We know what will happen, but we want to see it, experience it, and cheer as Greider bloodily cuts down one sinner after the other. It’s almost Old Testament justice. And how is the priest involved, he with his sermon about the story of Joseph, who is not the real father of Jesus?
Does Greider ride off into the sunset in the end? You’ll find out and, hopefully, enjoy this story, based on the book by Thomas Willmann. I was fortunate to see the film with German and English subtitles, which is probably not possible now in Hamburg. However German subtitles alone are a big help, when Austrian dialect is involved. This won two prizes at Bavarian festivals and showed at the 2014 Berlinale. ()