Institute of Contemporary Arts

Ulrich Seidl at the ICA

Date: 3 October 2008

Reviewers are inclined to describe Ulrich Seidl's films with words like ‘pessimistic', ‘unpleasant' and ‘dark'. Having never seen his acclaimed Cannes Grand Prix winning film Dog Days everything I had read made the prospect of watching his latest feature film Import/ Export a pretty grim prospect. I spent the first ten minutes or so bracing myself for a vision of hell but what greeted me was a beautifully paced very engaging film, carefully telling the story of an Austrian man and a Ukrainian woman each of whom ends up in the other's country in search of a better life. 

Seidl is famous for skating a very thin line between reality and fiction, using untrained actors often playing characters very close to their own in real life and on many occasions real people in real locations.  This does raise interesting questions about the nature of reality and illusion in film however, in practise what it actually does when you are watching it is infuse it with respect for its subjects.  Olga, the female lead, ends up working in a hospital in Vienna as a cleaner on a geriatric ward.  The filthy sheets and adult nappies on the real patients, instead of debasing the characters as you might imagine, in fact bring you closer to them and reveal the simple humanity of the situation. 

There's no doubt that some of the scenes are difficult to watch, in particular the humiliating scene with the prostitute who is a real prostitute performing real acts but it would be easy to reduce the film to its nastiness.  It is not unpleasant without being beautiful, nor dark without traces of humour and while there is pessimism the film clearly ends on a hopeful note of change for the better and redemption. 

Ulrich came to the ICA last Thursday and I interviewed him about all the good questions in life, the nature of truth, why do unpleasant things seem more real than pleasant ones, what's his favourite colour (not really) and that kind of thing.  Please do listen and let me know what you think, I thought he was rather charming and extremely intelligent.

 

Listen now (mp3)

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