Breathing Reviews

With an excellent direction by Markovics, who also wrote the script and was the protagonist of Die Fälscher, this is a moving drama that follows a nuanced, well-constructed character played impressively well by the so far unknown but talented Thomas Schubert.

I would give this movie 3 stars before because I think it's kind of fail realism, but the breathing connection is quite interesting

Karl Markovics combines gorgeous pictures with a thought-provoking story and creates a masterwork you will never forget.

A first film written and directed by the star of the excellent "The Counterfeiters", "Atmen" could have been another movie about the redemptive power of caring for the dead. But it isn't, though there are vague nods in that direction. "Atmen" is about a young man raised in an orphanage then committed to a juvenile detention facility slowly beginning to care about his life and connect to other people. It tells the story credibly and with great compassion for the varieties of people and how they cope with life.

True film making is telling a story without words. This film is about a 19 year old in a youth detention centre who takes on a job picking up dead bodies for the mortician ... and throughout the film it is revealed he has commit murder and is also looking for his birth mother. The screenplay and acting should win awards. STUNNING movie.

Atmen ist schlicht ein bewegender Film in dem nicht viel gesprochen wird, sondern mit Gesten und Aktionen die Story vorangetrieben wird.
Markovic hält sich daher als Regisseur eher zurück, was im Stil erkennbar ist und dem Film zugute kommt.
Hauptdarsteller (fällt gerade nicht sein Name ein) ist irgenwie faszinierend und erinnert mich an die Performance von Heath Ledger in Brokeback Mt. Sein stilles Sein und seine Wortkargheit, sich nur mit seinen Gesichtszügen auszudrücken wirkt mehr als authentisch und bringt ihm wahrscheinlich weltweit gute Kritiken ein.
Doch wie bei "Revanche" ist mir das Ende ein bisschen zu abprubt. Man wartet irgendwie auf eine Art Versöhnung mit dem Hauptcharakter, irgendein Gefühl, das vermittelt, der Film ist jetzt zu ende, ohne ein offenes Ende zu vermeiden.
Aufnahmen und Kameraführung sind top, aber gewöhnlich.Markovic scheint mit diesem Stil and vorherige Erfolge wie "Revanche" anzuknüpfen.
Doch alles im allem ein sehr bewegender und nachdenklicher Film, jedoch nicht zu vergleichen mit Filmen im selben Genre wie z.b "Biutiful".

Karl Markovics' debut film deals not just with one but two highly delicate themes: death and (youth) prison. Considering the difficulties I imagine researching and shooting this film - it's a movie of epic scale.

Atmen is about a young prisoner who tries to shorten his detainment by looking for work in civil life - he eventually gets one in a Viennese undertaker business where he first finds resistance and later friends.
It's a wonderful character study of Roman (the main character) - he was brought up in an orphanage abandoned by his mother never having felt any freedom in his whole life.

But Atmen not only depicts Roman's life but also is about his co-worker - a typical Viennese grumbler but eventually one of the "good" guys - about his divorced probation officer and also about his mother.

Highly moving and thought provoking!

PS: How did the Cannes jury understand the Viennese mentality (which is essential to understand some of what's going on) from subtitles?