Wow! A movie that gives you plenty of questions, but no real answers. Leaving it up to the discerning film-goer to make of it what they wish. With me, well-- it has taken me 24 hours to sit right down and write something about this challenging piece of work.
It's not the sudden act of the killing that shocked me, but the way in which the relationship sustained that act to survive. If made by other mindless filmmakers, there would have been loud confrontations, the law would have been involved, as well as the psychiatrists. But we were in the capable hands of Klaus, the writer and director, who handled this horrendous situation with maturity, focusing more on the strength of the relationship.
I will admit that after the first thirty minutes it was getting rather tedious. How many shots of the joyous cat can you have? And the utter love in the human relationship had me envious! It wasn't until the incident that it all came to life. By then I was angry because the director had masterfully drawn me to empathize with the cat (and I'm not much of a cat lover). How could he have done that to the poor defenseless cat? I was yelling at the screen, telling the lover to leave the relationship, and was completely stupefied by his decision not to, and that's why I kept watching, engrossed in the sudden change in this once loving relationship. What made it work was the top-notch performances from the leads, including the cat that we fell in love with.
As for cat lovers, maybe not for you, but if you do watch it, please do so with an open mind because it is not about the killing of a creature, but how a strong relationship sustains such an incident and how the human condition enables us to forgive no matter what.
It's not the sudden act of the killing that shocked me, but the way in which the relationship sustained that act to survive. If made by other mindless filmmakers, there would have been loud confrontations, the law would have been involved, as well as the psychiatrists. But we were in the capable hands of Klaus, the writer and director, who handled this horrendous situation with maturity, focusing more on the strength of the relationship.
I will admit that after the first thirty minutes it was getting rather tedious. How many shots of the joyous cat can you have? And the utter love in the human relationship had me envious! It wasn't until the incident that it all came to life. By then I was angry because the director had masterfully drawn me to empathize with the cat (and I'm not much of a cat lover). How could he have done that to the poor defenseless cat? I was yelling at the screen, telling the lover to leave the relationship, and was completely stupefied by his decision not to, and that's why I kept watching, engrossed in the sudden change in this once loving relationship. What made it work was the top-notch performances from the leads, including the cat that we fell in love with.
As for cat lovers, maybe not for you, but if you do watch it, please do so with an open mind because it is not about the killing of a creature, but how a strong relationship sustains such an incident and how the human condition enables us to forgive no matter what.