“A dark drama. Distinguished by very long takes, ominous cutaways to undulating river reeds, near-somnambulist underplaying by a first-rate cast and nail-on-the-head dialogue about materialism, hypocrisy, morality and mortality. The screenwriter, Daniel Nocke, has an ear for the self-justifying patter of soft-bellied parents, and he refreshingly prefers dread to mayhem. The chemistry between Ms. Gedeck and Mr. Selliger (who has the young William Hurt’s seductive verbosity) is sexy and smart."
– Matt Zoller Seitz, The New York Times

“As much a bulls-eyed survey of contemporary German attitudes toward youth, aging, sex and class as a classic psychological thriller set against a deceptively serene summer idyll. Deeply, delicately drawn performances of the 5-person cast. A deliciously loaded pas de deux between bill and Miriam. The methodically threaded and crossed high wires of tension are slowly, expertly tightened... Elements of L’AVVENTURA, SWIMMING POOL, and even A PLACE IN THE SUN materialize in the film’s sophisticated layering. (A) thorough and thoroughly engaging investigation of age (and entitlement) before beauty.”
– Michelle Orange, Village Voice

"MARVELOUS! A surprise ending amounts to one of the most heart-rendingly brilliant coups in directing, writing and acting I have ever experienced on the screen. Like only a few endings I can recall, it makes you rethink everything you have seen before."
– Andrew Sarris, The New York Observer

“A masterful and original thriller that matches Rohmer’s vacationing plots with the paranoid and anxious underpinnings of Polanski, coming together in a noir-tinged story of desire, infidelity responsibility – and, of course, moral ambiguity.”
– The L Magazine

“Mr. Krohmer’s evenly toned film avoids the expected sense of scandal or liberation. Yields unexpectedly complex ironies. SUMMER ’04 which made its premiere at Cannes last year, beguiles with a hard-to-place resilience and an unpredictable flow that detours after a tragedy is greeted with damning under-reaction. “
– Nicholas Rapold, New York  Sun

“An astonishingly graduated portrayal by Martina Gedeck (THE LIVES OF OTHERS). This controlled drama (takes) the Rohmeresque situation of vacation as catalyzing crisis for bourgeois desire, intergenerational triangles, and the dream of perennial self-invention, and carries it to its logical end, while coolly examining the costs of pleasure.”
– Philip Lopate, Film Comment

With echoes of Polanski’s KNIFE IN THE WATER, this contemporary German drama sketches a love triangle that plays out, in part, on a sailboat – and it is sailing over deep waters, capsizing and sinking that work as metaphors for the games two generations play during their summer vacation by the sea. A handsome, seemingly solid, 40ish couple and their teenage son welcome his Lolita-like pal to their cottage. When she strikes up an unlikely friendship with the hunky bachelor next door, mom’s sense of responsibility for her guest’s well-being becomes confused by her own sexual stirrings. Actress Martina Gedeck (THE LIVES OF OTHERS) gives a superb, subtle performance as an aging baby boomer who finds herself in heated competition with the next generation. Plus a Swedish animation, NEVER LIKE THE FIRST TIME – the title tells all.

Germany • 2006 • 97 minutes • In German with English subtitles • The Cinema Guild

NEVER LIKE THE FIRST TIME!
Directed by Jonas Odell

Four people each get to tell the story of their first time, in this animated film based on documentary interviews. Their stories are comic, tragic nostalgic, embarrassing and sometimes horrific. Each tale has one thing in common: it’s never like the first time!