Victoria

I never really write reviews or tell anyone about the stuff I watch, but for Victoria, I just had to make an exception

I was never so drawn into a movie before, it was amazing. The characters act so natural you really feel like you are experiencing this night with them for real. No 3D or any fancy stuff that movies do today can draw you into a film this much.

Sometimes during the movie - because all the location changes are perfect - I wondered how much time since the beginning of the movie has passed in "their world" - and then it came to me! You are with them all along, there is no timeskip, no narrating, nothing that could put your focus away from whats important:

The five characters and that fateful night.

I tell everyone I meet that they should go watch this movie: once this has been to a few more filmfestivals and stuff, there is no doubt that it will become a massive hit. I think this movie even surpasses "the life of the others" and I definitely would recommend it as one of the best German movies I know.

A night out alone for a Spanish immigrant, in a nightclub drinking shots she meets some guys she may lament, as they grab her by the hand and in one take she is enraptured, everything that she then does is caught on film, one piece all captured. On the streets over two hours where the past recalls a debt, a modest bank transaction to acquire, seek out and get, best laid plans do not turn out to be effective or thought through, it's not long before the state is chasing, running, lights on blue.

Wonderful performances all round, in a film that takes your breath away with what it seeks to achieve, and ultimately does spectacularly.

Shot in real time, filmed in one continuous take & made all the more believable by excellent performances from its cast, Victoria has that foreboding ambiance that keeps giving off the vibe that something unfortunate is about to happen all the time and even though its single- take gimmick is attention grabbing, it's the story & characters that hold this film together.

Victoria covers a couple of hours in the life of its titular character, a young Spanish woman in Berlin who, while leaving a club one early morning, meets four local guys who invite her to hang out with them for a while, to which she agrees. Although her adventurous night out with them ends on an amicable note, a last-minute favour asked by the guys alters her life forever.

Co-written & directed by Sebastian Schipper, the story of Victoria could've been easily told without the filmmakers trying to be ambitious with the camera but that added inventiveness brings an admiration of its own. The first half establishes the background of the characters as they stroll through Berlin streets & roofs but the next half is one nail-bitingly tense thriller that ups the ante considerably.

Its single take lasting 138 minutes might be the combined result of clever editing, seamless switching & careful masking but what impressed me most is the fact that despite it being an impressive technical feat, it never for once overshadows the unfolding drama which remains the centerpiece throughout its runtime. The actors are highly convincing in their given roles, which only gets better as the plot progresses, and it only helps in further uplifting the story.

On an overall scale, Victoria ends on a far better note than where it appeared to be heading during the first act, keeps its main focus on the titular character from beginning to end, and manages to be an emotionally rewarding experience with or without the one-shot gimmick. Devoting as much attention to its story as it invests in pulling off its technically challenging production, this German thriller deserves to be ranked amongst the finest films of this year. Thoroughly recommended.

...Is most impressive for its concept, the logistics needed to carry it out, and its sustained performances without a single cut. It hopes to involve the viewer as a participant in the story by following one girl's experiences over the course of two-and-a-quarter hours. It begins shortly before dawn, playing out in real time in one long, uninterrupted take from beginning to end.

The first hour or so sets up the characters as Victoria (Laia Costa), a recent immigrant to Berlin from her native Spain, meets four rather grungy local men while dancing and drinking in a flashy nightclub. They convince her to come with them as they wander aimlessly around the city, and then must go off to an appointment with a local gangster who wants them to pull off a robbery he's planned.

Unfortunately, the film really plods its way through much of the first hour, but of course the single-take concept eliminates the possibility for editing the dull parts. Ideally the script should have been pruned to establish the basics and then get into the main plot much sooner. Luckily the last hour and a half picks up both pace and tension dramatically once Victoria commits to accompanying these rather shiftless hoods to their meeting as their driver. It soon becomes quite gripping and much more involving with the plot's quick turns of events and limited point-of-view.

Without a doubt this movie is technical masterful. And I don't even agree that the one shot is a gimmick because as it should it serves a purpose here. Our two leads have amazing chemistry and no wonder Laia Costa continues to do big things.

That being said these are basically two movies. For one hour it is a great movie about young people meeting in Berlin at night. It has a certain romantic to it. Quit after that!

But then two things happen. It turns into a very different movie and secondly our main character Victoria looses every credibility. The choices she makes in this movie no real person would ever make. The script supposedly only had 14 pages. This is to me is when a director get's lost in his technical tools forgetting that the foundation of every movie is a good story. Victoria has none.