In Christian Petzold’s German tragic romance Undine, Paula Beer plays the title character, a young woman of passion and unproven emotional stability. One morning, she experiences a heartbreaking breakup and rebounds into a profound love story. The course of that love affair becomes operatic and supernatural, and very tragic.
In mythology, Undine was a water nymph, and Petzold maintains the story framework of the original legend, but sets it in contemporary times. Undine meets Christoph (Franz Rogowski). I often roll my eyes at a “meet cute”, and I sure didn’t expect one from Euro art film director Petzold, but this one really works. Christoph is capitated by Undine and persists in courting her. He becomes obsessed, she less so, and a tragic romance ensues.
Undine strives for the operatic but is too much of a slow burn (as in barely flickering at times).
I was thrilled by Petzold’s Barbara and then his Phoenix. I was much less satisfied by his Transit (also with Rogowski and Beer). I’m becoming less of a Petzold enthusiast after these last two disappointments.
Beer, as she was in Transit, is exceptionally expressive and captivating. Rogowski (whose supporting character in Victoria was the most memorable turn in that film) excels when he plays a haunted man – as he does here and in Transit.
I saw Undine at the Mill Valley Film Festival in October, and it opens in Bay Area theaters this weekend.