Review: Toni Erdmann

Maren Ade's Toni Erdmann is a soul-marination film. Every day that has passed since seeing this meditation of fathers and daughters and their takes of what makes life worth living has made me appreciate it more. This is a film you live with, perhaps forever, after seeing it. What an extraordinary achievement!

Over the course of nearly three hours, the film follows whimsical Winfried (Peter Simonischek) as he attempts to make his uptight daughter Ines (Sandra Hüller) happy. Their relationship feels strained at best towards the start of the film. After Winfried's dog dies and he begins to pop up in her life often in a getup of a wig and fake teeth. Ines is good at her job but she lacks social skills. She says at one point that fun is a "buzzword." For Winfried, fun is the best of what life has to offer.

Toni Erdmann is small scale taken to an epic scope. The plot is routine about a parent wanting to impart life lessons on their child about living in the moment. However Toni Erdmann feels anything but routine. There is a strong mixture of humor and sadness, hope and pain in every moment of the film. Director Maren Ade observes this relationship with such care and attentiveness to the details of both characters. Forget three-dimensional characters, the film's central characters feel like real people that you get to know.

As Ines tries to close a big deal at work, he father shows up more and more, even interacting with her boss. He tells him at one point that he has hired a new daughter, an upgrade, because Ines is never around. Ines initially puts up with her father's hijinks but then the film in its last third stacks two hilarious and heartbreaking scenes that show that Winfried is getting through to her. These two final big moments catapulted the movie into classic status for me. Sad-funny is a poor term here but it perhaps best describes the unique tone Toni Erdmann strikes.

Hüller gives a stunning performance as Ines. She embodies the character with so much nuance and depth. The physicallity of her performance shows us how Ines takes every situation she is in and finds away to survive it. This makes her eventually giving in to Winfried humor so powerful.

Toni Erdmann beams a message of hope in laughter for nearly three hours. It is a grand movie that actually believes in the power of comedy. It is a movie that had me in tears of laughter in one scene and then in tears of sadness the next. It is truly a remarkable film.

5/5