Die Freunde der Freunde (2002) (TV)

Director:

Dominik Graf

Writers:

Markus Busch (writer)
Dominik Graf (writer)

Release Date:

23 October 2002 (Germany)

Genre:

Drama | Romance

Plot Keywords:

Taxi Ride | Dancing | Best Friend | DV | Wallet

Awards:

2 wins & 2 nominations

Cast

Matthias Schweighöfer	...	Gregor
Sabine Timoteo	...	Billy
Florian Stetter	...	Arthur
Jessica Schwarz	...	Pia
Tanja Schleiff
Tabea Heynig
Peter Benedict
Marc Antonio Fischer
Katharina Klaffs
Christian Hoening
Ljubisa Ristic
Cornelia De Pablos
Klaus Haderer
Fabian von Klitzing
Janine Wegener

Runtime:

89 min

Country:

Germany

Language:

German

Color:

Color

Sound Mix:

Stereo

Filming Locations:

Munich, Bavaria, Germany

A magical, nearly poetic, highly erotic and tragic little movie where everything is in the right place

*** This comment may contain spoilers ***

CONTAINS SPOILERS!! A surprising TV-Movie which offers much more than many of those ourdays cinema-blockbuster-trash.

Very tense and atmospheric with a certain kind of feeling in it that is not often seen in a TV-Production. The movie looks like shot on Video and blown up onto the 1.85 : 1 widescreen aspect ratio. It is shot with an unsteady camera and uses only the lightning which appears to be there naturally. This provides a more intense mood. The acting is good and unusual. The characters are calm and there seems to be more than words and acting in the whole movie. All appearing characters seem to be strangely related deeply to each other. Worth a close look - unfortunately only on german TV-screens.

Gregor the main person is a young student who believes in a special connection between two people (man and woman) which exists for a lifetime. When these two meet one day, both know they are connected for ever and everywhere. So he meets Billie and believes she is the one for him. Billie keeps her distance at first. She is entangled by her past and her husband from whom she wants to get divorced.

Later she tells Gregor that she was visited by a friend of hers. But exactly at the same time during that visit her friend died 400 km far away. A similar thing happened to Gregors best friend Arthur. When Arthur´s father died at home, he saw him standing in a forest and watched him. After the death of his father Arthur gets involved in secrets of his fathers buiseness affairs and takes advantage of them to use his knowledge to blackmail some rich men.

The viewer of the movie never knows more than Gregor about Arthur´s dark affairs or Billie´s past. And that isn´t much. That´s one point why this movie is so unusual. Because of this reason the film always stays mystical and tense - and shows much passion.

After a short time Gregor and Billie become a couple and Gregor is convinced she must meet with Arthur because of their experience seeing "ghosts". For some strange reasons this meeting never takes place. We get the feeling, that not only Gregor feared the meeting of the three. When Arthur gets murdered by a man he tried to blackmail, Billie and him meet at last. After that Gregor and Billie will never see each other again.

The movie, with its tragic ending, the death of Gregors best friend, and finally the insight, that Arthur´s soul is connected to Billie (whom she visited as a ghost) touches the viewer deeply.

I enjoyed this one much (I didn´t want to watch TV at all but it caught me from the very beginning. I coudn´t move my eyes away). A mystical, nearly poetic, highly erotic and tragic little movie where everything is in the right place. I hope such movies never get a hollywood re-make ;)