Jonathan

For the simple story. for use of details. for the slow pace. for the sensuality and for the fight against past. for the discover of life by Jonathan, interpreted in decent manner by Jannis Niewohner. sure, it is not an original story. but one who could be touching because, in smart way, discover different perspectives about family life,sufferance and youth, giving a wise portrait of pain and last refuge, about desire and love, about a meet who resurrect hidden events, the confusion and angry and vulnerability of a young man for who reality knows profound changes. a farm and a family. and the return of a familiar stranger.and the choice as foundation of own life.

Slow moving, beautiful and touching. It may not be for everyone, but I enjoyed this film.

There was a gay themed American movie dealing with terminal cancer, but in that movie, there wasn't the overwhelming sadness of dealing with the death of a loved one. Instead, death was portrayed as natural and almost besides the point. Here the audience is slammed repeatedly with the dire consequences of being mortal and getting terminal skin cancer. The gay subplot and dark family secrets become almost irrelevant. The scene where the central, dying character had one final orgasm with his long absent partner in a hospital bed seemed totally contrived and unreal. The writer seemed to be saying that sex and love are the same. To equate those two subjects close to the moment of agonizing death seemed vulgar. Acting and production values were good; hence the 6 rating.

I don't want to be too critical because this is a foreign language film in a foreign language I'm not that versed in. But it seemed to me that Jonathan moved at a snail's pace and about a third of it could have been cut.

Hunky jock type Jannis Niewohner is in the title role, in America we'd say he was an All American kid. He's working the family farm which doesn't look any different from one in our mid west heartland with his father, taking on more and more responsibility because dad is dying of skin cancer. He's also got an aunt eyeing him like a slab of meat and he does give her a prime cut.

Now that he's dying dad played by Andre Hennicke decides to come out to him. The love of his life was Thomas Sarbacker who now that he's dying sees no need for secrets. He moves on in and that sure upsets the young man and the household.

I've seen this played out in all cultures. Back in the day gay was verboten over there and Hennicke married a woman for convention's sake. Not all that different from Brokeback Mountain.

A nice story, a necessary one, but the pace was way too slow.

And here's another movie that comes from Germany and looks like a TV production. I admit that I'm already annoyed when it's thematically about freedom and you immediately see a bird circling in the sky. The obligatory cheap guitar music is missing because there was no money for an orchestra. André Hennicke plays a sick man, the father of Jonathan (Jannis Niewöhner). The two have a complicated relationship, which is immediately clear. Then Anka appears, a young nurse who has everything that such women don't actually have. But of course, she is an actress and looks like one - as do all the actors in this movie. Yes, I'm complaining about more realism and less film school here, because everything reeks of formalism and is also quite homophobic in its basic mood, despite being from 2016. The pace is tiring and the landscape shots don't interest me at all. If I want to watch flies fly, I open the window. Jannis Niewöhner hasn't done his career any favors here and certainly won't really point to his role as the highlight of his career.