EVERYONE ELSE
Written & Directed by Maren Ade
Produced by Janine Jackowski, Dirk Engelhardt & Ade
Written by Nebbou & Cyril Gomez-Mathieu
Released by Cinema Guild
German with English subtitles
Germany. 120 min. Not Rated
With Birgit Minichmayr, Lars Eidinger, Nicole Marischka & Hans-Jochen Wagner
 

The mark of originality may not be the ability to generate novel content, but the gift of interpreting an age-old scenario in a fresh and intelligent way. By this account, Everyone Else—a deceptively simple German film about a young relationship—is stunningly original. In a style at once hyper-realistic and polished, director Maren Ade explores the nooks and crannies of a couple’s interactions over the course of a lazy vacation in Sardinia. Chris (Lars Eidinger), an idealistic architect struggling with his ambition, and Gitti (Brigit Minichmayr), a laid-back, salt of the earth music publicist, appear to be an ostensibly happy match. They enjoy a seemingly recently found comfort with one another, but without an indication of the length of their affair, the audience is recruited as spying anthropologists, challenged to diagnose the nature of the bond. We look for clues in their fights, their sex, their silences, recognizing universal tensions and completely unique nuances.

Unlike a mumblecore film that revels in reality for reality’s sake, this documentation of a human interaction is loaded with analytic takeaways. At the core of their relationship is a struggle between private affection and the public projection of their image (as a couple and as individuals). In the confines of their house, Chris and Gitti share a silly, whimsical connection. Here, the significant differences in their background and personalities—her impulsive energy contrasts to his quiet self-reflection—are softened and ignored. Chris and Gitti flourish in each other’s company, putting the rest of the world, and their irreconcilable character traits, on hold. But in public, where real or imagined expectations are triggered by every passerby, the couple’s festering resentment and incongruous self-consciousness introduces tension and self-doubt. The aspect of their relationship that suffers most in the light of day is the couple’s assumption of gender roles. Gitti has a simpler, matter-a-fact personality that suggests masculinity, while Chris’ overly reflective self-doubt and passive nature place him in a more feminine role.

Everyone Else boldly addresses the unsavory desire to brashly present ourselves as a fully realized member of a social type—be it bohemian or posh, intellectual or homespun. In an age where authenticity and trueness-to-self (whatever that means) are revered, this inclination for self-invention is somewhat embarrassing and rarely explored with such care and honesty. The acting is equally sincere. Chris and Gitti reenact the natural ebb and flow of tension in a relationship, sometimes triggered by a microscopic change in mood. Despite the profound insights, the thrill of reality recreated somehow makes Everyone Else a light, and at times even joyful, experience. Yana Litovsky
April 9, 2010