A somewhat impressionist, at times even slightly surreal miniature about a student (Werner Stocker in a splendid performance) who, out of financial difficulties, starts out as pool attendant at an open air swimming pool in Berlin's district of Neukölln. Escaping from his unpleasant landlord and his lover Patrizia (a very young Martina Gedeck), he soon starts to live at the baths, and as swimmers disappear and the baths are closed for the winter, he turns the grounds into his own, perfect refuge from civilisation and social pressure, becoming increasingly detached from reality. What may sound like an annoyingly gimmicky premise is executed here playfully, yet with admirable simplicity and a subtle, unpretentious poetic sensibility that one would wish for more often in contemporary German cinema.
May 1987
In her essay film, Eva Hiller illustrates the nightly infrastructure of a large city, using Frankfurt am Main and Berlin as examples. Just as pet reptiles gone feral are reported to populate New York's sewers, so too is there bustling activity – often invisible to outsiders – when darkness falls on Germany’s metropolises.
Oct 1991
