Strange Summer (The)
- Director: Jules Herrmann
- Writer: Jules Herrmann
- Producer: Roswitha Ester; Jules Herrmann
CGiii Comment
There is a story...somewhere, buried under a ton of irrelevance and a mind-boggling mixture of genres....a touch of Ibsen, a dab of Hitchcock, a blob of Disney, a splodge of Hell-knows-what!
Yes, folks...it's a bit of a mess.
Some may find this curious film to be pleasingly puzzling, even perplexing...but, alas, this feeble mind could not decipher a whit of semblance that made any sense. Non-sense!
Obviously, director/writer/producer did! Perhaps, we are - simply - not worthy.
Oh...and kill that opening peacock scene!
Trailer...
The(ir) Blurb...
Teacher Antek Liebmann leaves his life in Germany behind and rents a place in summery northern France. He learns from his landlord that a murderer is striking terror in the surrounding woods. Following a dark premonition, Antek is drawn into the undergrowth on one of his walks where he makes a dangerous discovery. He befriends his attractive neighbour Geneviève and the cheery Sébastien. No one realises that Antek has left behind a terrible secret in his own country. Only the discovery of a mysterious property to which Geneviève takes him and the possibility of a new romantic relationship present Antek with a way out of the darkness. But before he can begin a new life he must confront the ghosts of his past, conjure them up and exorcise them.
The storytelling is like the feathers of a peacock, oscillating between unobtrusive glimmering and striking iridescence. And so gentle summer days slide into night-time terrors or vanish in short flights of fancy into parallel worlds.
Cast & Characters
Godehard Giese as Antek Liebmann;
Adeline Moreau as Genevieve;
Fabien Ara;
Bettina Grahs;
Alain Denizart;
Denise Lecocq;
Morgane Delamotte