Product: Run, Lola, Run [VHS] (1999)
Rating: 5.0
One of my Top 10 of 1999
I'll just cut to the chase. It's in German, it's subtitled, and you'll do yourself a disservice by not reading on. Run Lola Run is the hippest, most original thriller since The Matrix.Remember how everyone, including myself, was so amazed by the fact that 1999's hit The Blair Witch Project cost so little to make? Here's another fact: Germans, like most Europeans, have never had the luxury of a big budget. Indeed, the reason they don't make films like The Matrix is because they can't afford to. The other side of the coin is that they have learned to be exceptionally inventive. It's a shame their movies don't have much of an audience here, and I generally believe that subtitles are a problem. Ironically, Hollywood makes half it's money overseas, and in all non-English speaking territories, our movies are dubbed. That's why you can listen to a DVD movie in French or Spanish, if you care to. These are simply the soundtracks from the foreign releases.Luckily for us, Run Lola Run is almost entirely a visual experience, with a storyline so simple that complex dialog isn't necessary. The throbbing techno-industrial music is a key to the enjoyment of the movie, but these sounds are universal.How's this for simple? Lola gets a phone call from her boyfriend, Manni. A drug deal has gone horribly wrong [I won't tell you how!], and if she doesn't get a large sum of money to him in twenty minutes, he's a dead man. So Lola runs - literally - to try and get the money. In a plot device so clever you will simply have to see it for yourself, Lola gets not one but three tries of twenty minutes each to successfully complete her task. Each attempt starts out in exactly the same way, but because of the way small things occur as she is running down the stairway of her apartment building, there are three different outcomes. All of them are startling and unexpected. It is left to each viewer to decide which outcome they prefer.The acting is uniformly excellent, from the two leads down to the smallest roles. As Lola, Franica Potente has an intensity and an energy level that is almost exhausting. Of course, she must have run a thousand or so miles to prepare for this very physical role. Moritz Bleibtreu is perfect as Manni. He is utterly believable as a guy who gets himself in a situation which is at once scary, because if the consequences and hilarious, because it is caused by the silliest of mistakes.Writer and director Tom Tykwer is a major new force behind the camera. Like many Europeans before him, the success of this movie may lure him to the bright lights and big budgets of Hollywood. Even if he refuses the call, which might be a wise decision, his is the kind of inventive moviemaking that will be copied over and over again anyway. And why not? Herr Tykwer's cinematic tricks are well worth repeating.