Der menschliche Faktor

Sundance Film Fest #1: HUMAN FACTORS

Deliberately constructed family dysfunction drama about how solipsism and bias frame perspectives told through the lens of a mostly uneventful home invasion. Though confusing in structure at first due to the loose framework around time and perspective, the decision to withhold key conflicts until after we see how they impact quiet bystanders makes this more of a compelling mystery than the otherwise straightforward story would normally allow. We're also somewhat implicated in the subtle abuses, neglect, and gaslighting, not capturing their significance until we're given added perspective from a different character. Though it all works as a metaphor for cultural relations (racism) and the inherent presumptions we make based on what we see, what works here is the subtle domestic discord and how people wrapped up in their own petty squabbles can miss the unbearable trauma in those closest to them.

And serious, at the border of boring filmaking, a story told in retrospect, a groundhog dayish fable of a family in crisis and despair, told from each family members prospektive, just where the human factor rings a bell and shows in a european filmstyle the aspect of the human factor.

Its not a fun film, sehr ernst and geduldig, couldve been 15 minutes shorter, and the entity of it all becomes far to deep for a grumpy old man.have a look if you love german movies, but this wasnt recommendable from my perspective.

There's something in the air in the movie that don't follow up. You think things are getting more mysterious but they don't go that way. But it's was a very good approach of the storytelling line that keeps coming back to certain points of the narrative the keep me going, just wish the whatever where it's was should have been landed in the end but it just so vague, more then normal for these indie movies.

We kick off Sundance today with world dramatic entry Human Factors. What seemed to be a slow beginning quickly turned into an engaging watch. The use of different points of view from each family member only added to the drama of a family falling apart. At first it was hard to distinguish the time frame so there was a little bit of disorientation, but quickly it revealed the setup in a manner easier to follow. Performances were great on all parts, but Sabine Timoteo won me over. May I also add the gorgeous cinematography to take into consideration. Writer and director Donny Trocker made a beautiful film and I wish him all the luck in upcoming awards.

Wanna watch a boring foreign film about a kinda dickish man and overly annoying woman being passive-aggressive to each other? Want the catalyst of all that to be based on a nothing burger incident? Wanna see that incident replayed over and over in a Roshomon-type structure from the perspective of the dickish man, annoying woman, AND their bland son and lame daughter? Wanna slog through all that with the style of the boring parts of a Michael Haneke film, without any of the fun violent bits, and just end up at the uninteresting nonexistent payoff? If you answered "yes" to any of these questions, you'll like this movie way more than I did.