Atmen
| Breathing | |
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Film poster
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| Directed by | Karl Markovics |
| Written by | Karl Markovics |
| Starring |
Thomas Schubert Karin Lischka Gerhard Liebmann |
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Release date
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Running time
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90 minutes |
| Country | Austria |
| Language | German |
Breathing (German: Atmen) is a 2011 Austrian art house drama film filmed by cinematographer Martin Gschlacht, directed and written by Karl Markovics. The film concerns a 19-year-old inmate in a detention facility for juveniles, with a pending application for parole, who is challenged to reconsider his identity by a trial work-release job at a morgue . Starring Thomas Schubert, Karin Lischka and Gerhard Liebmann, it was screened at the 2011 Cannes Film Festival. Schubert won Best Actor at the 17th Sarajevo Film Festival for his performance, presented to him by Angelina Jolie.
The film was selected as Austria's submission to the 84th Academy Awards for Best Foreign Language Film, but it did not make the final shortlist.
Roman Kogler is a 19-year old prisoner in an Austrian juvenile detention centre. The movie appears to encompass a roughly two week period leading up to his parole hearing, during which time he starts a trial month employed as a mortuary attendant, a job being an important qualification for parole. The protagonist, Roman Kogler, appears in every scene, and the narrative arc concerns his emotional awakening, explored in the actor's facial expressions and postures, reinforced by visual symbolism and a sparse dialogue with other characters. Initially sullen, he's isolated from his fellow inmates, from the probation counselor who tries earnestly to help him, from the guards and from his new co-workers. As Roman endures stubbornly, with the passive, stoic indifference to his own fate of the truly hopeless, and as he begins to learn his new job, small events seem to awaken emotions in Kogler, leading to a new interest in understanding his own past and in the possibility of sympathetic relationships.
The first scene introduces Roman Kogler as he is interviewing for a job in a metal-working factory, and he is lying about his welding skills to the foreman. When the foreman moves to place a welder's mask on his face, he jumps back, uttering a stifled scream. Next, we see a bleak and empty roadway stretching off to an empty horizon; after a few moments, a car approaches on the left and Kogler appears from behind the camera, walking determinedly away at the right edge of the pavement, no reachable destination in sight. The car, having made a u-turn out of sight, returns to view and stops ahead blocking Kogler's progress and Kogler gets in the car, slamming the passenger door twice. The car is driven by Walter Fakler, Kogler's probation counselor, who has come to fetch Kogler after the disaster at the metalworking job. Sullen and laconic, Kogler is quietly, resentfully defiant with the earnest, exasperated Fakler. Returning Kogler to prison, Fakler hands him a newspaper, and admonishes him to look through the want ads, warning Kogler that he will expect to meet with him on Monday.
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