"Królik po berlinsku" or "Mauerhase" or "Rabbit à la Berlin" is a German/Polish co-production from 7 years ago that brought writer and director Bartosz Konopka an Oscar nomination and his career-defining film so far. I have a bit of a problem though with the category placement. First of all, at 50 minutes, this is not a short film anymore, by IMDb standards or by mine. And you could also argue if it is really a documentary as almost all of the people depicted in here were actors as well and their responses were scripted in order to fit the general approach of the film. This general approach is talk about the GDR and its citizens, but refer to them as rabbits instead of humans. Rabbits are people too right? Anyway, I must say this was an interesting idea. Lets be honest, the topic of the German split into two countries has been elaborated on sufficiently in film by now, so it's always difficult to being something new to the table and you could really only do so by the approach you give the subject and not really by the contents itself. That's why I think Konopka brought us a really creative metaphorical take on the whole topic here, maybe one that is not working entirely for 40 minutes, so I'd have preferred this one to be maybe only 30 minutes long. But I am fine with this one being Oscar-nominated, even if it lost to "Music by Prudence". I recommend checking it out. Just don't go in it expecting an animal documentary because with rabbits being shot, this is the last thing you'll get. Thumbs up for "Mauerhase" and I hope Konopka still has enough creativity in him to top his achievement here at some point, or at least repeat it. After all, he's still a prolific filmmaker.
Review of Królik po berlinsku
