The Silence

Amazing German film by the directors of Dark. I went and search for more movies by the writer and director from Dark and this came up, gave it a chance and loved it. It is definitely a very strong and intense subject, we had to watch a happier film after this. But if you’re in the mood something dense and for an interesting storyline, give it a shot. The description does not says it all..

We didn't have high expectations for this, but if you can make it through the opening sequence (which was filmed in the least offensive manner possible imho) this is a gripping movie. Lots of emotion, suspense, amazing cinematography. Somehow, despite the subject matter, this movie evokes beauty and humanity. Highly recommend it.

"The Silence" is like the ultimate game of hide and seek, but instead of a cozy living room, we're diving headfirst into wheat fields where secrets lurk amidst the golden stalks. Then there's the abandoned bicycle, which might just be the most emotionally complex character in the film, evoking a sense of abandonment and loss with every rusted gear and deflated tire.

First, this film is nowhere near as intelligently and deftly written or directed as The Killing. Long pauses in dialogue, silence, and agonized vacant staring into space are often the tools of lazy and pretentious film making. Bergman and the Coen brothers (Fargo) could do "unspoken" right. Not this director. The endearing idiosyncratic cliches are out in full effect; a practically autistic scruffy detective who, oddly, gets sent out to deliver the news of a child's death to the parents. A pregnant and sweetly cautionless detective. "I'm just asking people if they are a homicidal pedophile, guess I will sit and eat cookies with a potential suspect at his place like I really care about his cookies. And if he gets up in the middle of my discussion of a recent child murder, I will let him get out of my line of sight and then turn my back to where he went." If you can't stand cheap plot devices, unlikely behavior, and obvious emotional manipulation, stay away from this movie. The Silence uses long pauses (silence) in dialogue to communicate anxiety and hesitation. I am guessing that the director thought that this was a profound way to underline the title and theme of this film...the 23 year silence of one character about a crime he did nothing to stop. The movie dangles the ridiculous possibility that the viewer could develop empathy for one of the pedophiles. We get lots of shots of his face communicating his tortured moral struggle. I did not care that he was struggling with his urges...he was as guilty and grotesque as his more "active" partner in rape and murder. My reaction isn't an emotional response, it is basic to character development. There is no reason in the film to find Timo (the "nice" pedophile) any more worthy of forming an attachment to--other than that he has a family, whereas the "bad" pedophile doesn't.

This isn't a fast-paced suspense, more of a slow-burn. I like crime movies, so this was a good watch for me. Subtitles don't bother me at all.

The story is involves two murders of young girls twenty three years apart but it's really about loneliness. In contrast to the shining sunlight of Bavaria is the interior darkness of many of the characters.I couldn't take my eyes off the screen

Wooden, over-the-top performances.Amateur, poorly written dialog.Implausible plot and situations.Just a mix of movie tropes, inane dialog and overly used story of cops hunting a serial killer.

A foreign film worth watching! The acting was superb and it kept me guessing until the end! I was hoping it to be a bit longer and I am wondering if a sequel is in the making.

An unsettling thriller, European film at its best. A taught story linking an old murder to repeat itself, forcing the present to confront the past.

This was one of the best films I've watched over the past few years. It is quite disturbing as it deals with the taboo subject of pedophilia. It does not exploit the topic through cheap sensationalism but rather portrays the inner turmoil and personality traits of the typical pedophile. The film also does a fantastic job of developing the characters of the individuals investigating the crimes and the families dealing with the devastation of the loss of a child. I was left with a sense of unease from start to finish as the tension never subsides. I strongly recommend this film to foreign film lovers who are willing to tolerate subtitles in order to view an excellent film.

Le réalisateur réussit à placer le spectateur dans une ambiance lourde: celle du non-dit, du poids de la culpabilité, de l'histoire de chacun... Une belle découverte.

A film about child rape and how the lives affected deal with the perpetrator once they catch him.

German screenwriter and director Baran Bo Odar`s feature film debut which he wrote and co-produced, is an adaptation of a novel from 2007 by German writer Jan Costin Wagner. It premiered at the 63rd Locarno International Film Festival in 2010, was shot on location in Erfurt, Nürnberg and Erlangen in Germany and is a German production which was produced by producers Jörg Schulze, Maren Lüthje, Florian Schneider and Frank Evers. It tells the story about a rural town in Germany where an eleven-year-old girl was brutally murdered on her way home on her bicycle on a summer day in July 1986. The case was never solved and the residents went on with their lives, but twenty-three years later a young girl by the name of Sinikka Weghamm leaves her parents to meet some of her friends and does not return home. The following day, a police officer named David Jahn who recently returned to his job after having been away due to the loss of his wife, is informed that a local farmer has seen a gym bag and a rock covered in blood on the cornfield where the crime in 1986 took place. Shortly after David, his pregnant partner Jana Gläser and his superior officer Matthias Grimmer have gotten started with the investigation of the case, the whole town learns about the disappearance of Sinikka Weghamm. The disturbing news affects all the residents in the small community and especially the mother of the first victim Elena Lange, Timo Friedrich, a married architect with two children and Krischan Mittich, the former police officer on the unsolved case who thinks the two cases are related.Distinctly and precisely directed by Swiss-born filmmaker Baran Bo Odar, this finely paced and incisive fictional tale draws an invariably intriguing and unsettling portrayal of a complicated investigation of a gruesome crime and an intimate friendship between a caretaker and a former maths student. While notable for its naturalistic and colorful milieu depictions, the ardent cinematography by cinematographer Nikolaus Summerer, production design by German production designer Christian M. Goldbeck and production designer Yesim Zolan and the efficient use of sound, this character-driven and narrative-driven psychological thriller interrelates multiple stories, depicts several studies of character and examines themes such as interpersonal relations, interpersonal communication, friendship and grief.Set in a German town close to the countryside during the early 21st century, this foreboding and melodramatic tale about the correlation between good and evil and beauty and violence, contains a fine score by composers Paz De Deaux, Kris Steininger and Michael Kamm and is impelled and reinforced by its fragmented narrative structure and the engaging and involving acting performances by Danish actor Ulrich Thomsen, German actor Burghart Klaussner, German actress Katrin Sass, German actor Wotan Wilke Möhring and German actor Sebastian Blomberg. A poignantly atmospheric and suspenseful independent film which gained the Frankfurt Book Fair Award for Best International Literary Film Adaptation in 2010.