Taking Off
| Movie | |
|---|---|
| German title | Taking Off |
| Original title | Taking Off |
| Country of production | United States |
| original language | English |
| Publishing year | 1971 |
| length | 93 minutes |
| Age rating | FSK 16 |
| Rod | |
| Director | Miloš Forman |
| script | Miloš Forman Jean-Claude Carrière |
| production | Alfred W. Crown |
| music | Mike Heron |
| camera | Miroslav Ondříček |
| cut | John Carter |
| occupation | |
| |
Taking off is a feature film by Czech director Milos Forman of 1971 . Milos Forman's first film for an American studio is an amused and critical look at the façade of the upper middle class in an America of the early 1970s ravaged by a crisis of meaning. In Germany it is also known under the reference title Ich bin durchgebrannt .
action
The story revolves around the typical American suburban family. Lynn and Larry Tyne have a 15-year-old daughter, Jeannie, who has suddenly disappeared - only the viewer knows that she is at a singing casting in New York . Larry Tyne is instructed by a half-baked psychiatrist in the art of smoking cessation and also lets his friend Tony participate in his sessions via sub-ordination.
While one learns little about the missing Jeannie in the course of the film (does she actually take drugs or not?), The so decent life of her parents is exposed all the more freely in front of the amazed viewer. Dad and his buddy Tony go through the pubs in search of their little daughter and get drunk while mum listens to the tales of Tony's wife Margot, who seems to be more plagued than blessed by a man with "a bull" and sleeps late whose pleasure is sometimes compelled to sing and dance. To everyone's surprise, the daughter suddenly reappears at home, only to be driven away again by the drunk father ("She took something?").
Now again on the hunt for his 'runaway' daughter, Larry meets Ann Lockston after an aimless stroll through New York - she too misses a daughter. She introduces Larry to the SPFC, an association for "abandoned parents". After a call from the police that the daughter had been arrested in a theft, Lynn and Larry set out to get their daughter out of custody. The arrested girl is not Jeannie, but her friend Corinna, who just gave a wrong name. On the way back, Lynn and Larry spend the night in an unspecified location, where at least Ike and Tina Turner have an appearance. After Larry goes to bed tired, Lynn stays up a little longer and is then promptly attacked by two shady characters. The following sequence can hardly be surpassed in terms of bizarre and then changes in several in / out cuts to a meeting of the SPFC, at which an attempt is made by them to provide general information to the 'orphaned' parents present. Larry discovers Ann Lockston among the numerous participants, together with Ann's husband Ben Larry and Lynn take part in the cannabis test. Correspondingly, the married couples Tyne and Lockston then invade their home in Tynes ... a strip poker game takes place in which Jeannie catches her father stark naked on the living room table - of course THE American catastrophe ... and finally Jeannie's fiancé turns up.
Especially this, last part of the film leaves the apparently so badly battered, concerned parents once again in a revealing light: The horror of the bourgeoisie, a long-haired, rather taciturn hash brother, turns out to be a great musical earner at dinner, which is shamefully arranged for all sides even dad can enjoy lighting a cigarette again and sing a "Stranger in Wonderland" together with nuts on the piano ...
criticism
- film-dienst : The first film by the Czech Milos Forman shot in the USA exposes the weaknesses of the boys and even more the weaknesses of the parents in a sharp satire that hits the basics despite the occasional blatant drawing.
This and that
- The film was inspired by the Beatles song She's Leaving Home .
- During the casting , you can see Carly Simon, who was still largely unknown at the time, as well as Kathy Bates (in the cast as 'Bobo Bates') in her first film with a self-composed song ( And even the horses had wings ). Later Ike and Tina Turner also appear: Live.
Awards
The film won the Grand Jury Prize at the Cannes Film Festival in 1971 and was nominated for the main prize. In 1972 Taking Off won the Bodil for Best Non-European Film. In the same year, six nominations followed for the British Society of Film and Television Arts Award , the later BAFTA Award (Best Film, Director, Screenplay, Editing, Lynn Carlin as Best Actress and Georgia Engel as Best Supporting Actress) and the Prize of the Writers Guild of America .
Web links
- Taking Off in the Internet Movie Database (English)
Individual evidence
- ↑ Taking Off. In: Lexicon of International Films . Film service , accessed March 2, 2017 .