‘The Light’ Review: Tom Tykwer Tests Germany’s White Liberal Guilt With A Bohemian Musical Fantasy – Berlin Film Festival
deadline.comBeware novel psychological therapies from Austria: You never know where they may lead. In the curious case of German director Tom Tykwer’s The Light, which opened the Berlin Film Festival, such a quacky therapy — mostly involving a flashing LED light and an egg-timer — is Syrian refugee Farrah’s comfort, an escape hatch from the horrors of her life and, ultimately, a tool to heal the multiple afflictions tearing apart the German family for whom she is keeping house.
The parents are in failing couples therapy, the kids are disaffected, and Farrah appears from nowhere to sort them out. Sort of like Mary Poppins, but with extra lashings of fragrant Orientalism.
At first, a handful of characters are introduced, the connections between them drip-fed, Magnolia-style, over a long series of intercut scenes where we see them at work and play.
Milena Engels (Nicolette Krebitz) is working in Kenya on an arts project funded from Germany, all local color and general mismanagement.
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