The Air I Breathe - The Power of Fate

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Movie
German title The Air I Breathe - The Power of Fate
Original title The Air I Breathe
Country of production United States
original language English
Publishing year 2007
length 95 minutes
Age rating FSK 16
Rod
Director Jieho Lee
script Jieho Lee
Bob DeRosa
production Darlene Caamano
Emilio Diez Barroso
Paul Schiff
music Marcelo Zarvos
camera Walt Lloyd
cut Robert Hoffman
occupation

The Air I Breathe - The power of fate (Original title: The Air I Breathe ) is an American love drama directed by Jieho Lee . The film is based on an old Chinese proverb that divides life into four emotions, love , sorrow , happiness and pleasure .

It stars Kevin Bacon , Brendan Fraser , Forest Whitaker, and Sarah Michelle Gellar .

content

The film is divided into four episodes. Each of these episodes is associated with a feeling and is linked to the others through the character played by Andy García called Fingers, who plays a leading role in every part of the film.

luck

Forest Whitaker plays a bank clerk who has a passion for butterflies. When he randomly from a seemingly safe bet in a rigged horse race stops, he decides to challenge his luck, as the predicted winning horse named Butterfly (dt. Butterfly ) wearing. He borrows $ 50,000 from the bookmakers but loses the bet. Shortly thereafter, he is mangled by Fingers, who got his name from his habit of cutting off the fingers of defaulting debtors. Now Fingers wants to collect the bank employee's betting debts.

In order to settle his betting debts and keep his fingers, the bank clerk decides to rob a bank. He escapes with the cash he has captured and is hit by a young girl in her car. A pizza delivery man on a scooter asks if everything is okay and the bank clerk takes the scooter and drives away. He manages to get to the roof of a building and is surrounded by the police. He is supposed to drop the gun, but instead he throws the bag with the money on the street. The police opened fire on him.

pleasure

Brendan Fraser plays a man who has the gift of foreseeing the future of the people he meets. This deprived him of the pleasure of being surprised. As a child, he witnessed his younger brother being killed in a street fight. Although he foresaw the attack, he could not save his brother.

He now works for Fingers as a debt collector. When Fingers nephew Tony visits his uncle, he is given the task of looking after Tony. Since he sees Tony climbing up a fence, getting stuck and falling in a vision, he doesn't want him to do his dangerous work and drops him off at a nightclub. One of the girls who were supposed to take care of Tony, however, staggers into the next room in a drug intoxication and gets closer to an older man. Tony is upset because she's lost interest in him. The girl picks up the older man's gun and waves it around wildly until a shot is fired in the scuffle with Tony, which hits the man and causes his bodyguards to rush up. The debt collector arrives just in time to get Tony out of the building.

Their escape ends in a back yard in front of a locked gate. Surprisingly, Tony makes it over the fence that blocks their way. Instead, the debt collector is grabbed, dragged back and knocked to the ground. After the unequal fight, he is admitted to the hospital, smeared with blood but laughing. He is happy to have been surprised again for the first time in a long time.

Grief

Sarah Michelle Gellar plays a pop singer with the stage name "Trista" . As a little girl, she watched her father die in a car accident. Her manager owes Fingers and secretly settles it with Trista's earnings. When her assets are used up, the manager gives Trista "in payment", but Trista manages to escape from Fingers and flees. When she desperately wants to throw herself in front of a car, she is saved by Fraser's character and taken to his apartment. He assures her that Fingers won't look for her there. The two get closer in the next few days and sleep together. However, Fingers finds out where Trista is and kills Fraser's character. Trista is forced to go back on stage to raise money for Fingers.

love

Kevin Bacon plays a doctor who is in love with his longtime girlfriend Gina. However, he doesn't dare to tell her. A snake bite puts Gina in mortal danger. She has a very rare blood group for which the hospital does not have any blood supplies . When the doctor sees an interview with the pop singer Trista on TV, he learns that she has this blood type. He drives to the concert hall where Trista is supposed to perform. Her new manager is about to help her escape. However, this escape is thwarted by the doctor who storms on her. Trista falls and has to be taken to the hospital.

It turns out that Trista is pregnant. Fingers sees his income at risk and promises her that she will have to have an abortion after her recovery . Trista leaves shortly afterwards alone the room and goes to the roof of the hospital to suicide to commit. The arriving doctor sees her from the parking lot and manages to reach her in time to save her. Trista then donates the blood that Gina needs and soon afterwards leaves the hospital in the doctor's car, who wishes her all the best.

The End

Trista is driving down a street in the doctor's car when suddenly the bank clerk jumps in front of the car and rushes into the street. The bank employee takes the scooter and drives away again. Finally he throws the bag from the roof of the building, which falls onto the roof of Trista's car.

The film ends with Trista walking along the airport with her bag to leave the country.

background

The Air I Breathe was filmed in Mexico City . Filming began on 16 January 2006 and ended on 18 April 2006. The budget of the film was 10 million US dollars estimated. The film was released on February 8, 2008 on the European Film Market . This was followed by other screenings at various film festivals, including the Cannes International Film Festival on May 17, 2007. On January 25, 2008, the film was shown for the first time in US cinemas. The DVD was released in Germany on March 27, 2009. On the opening weekend in the USA, almost 20,000 US dollars were recorded, and around 25,000 US dollars were earned in the first two weeks. Outside of the United States, it generated almost $ 860,000 in global revenue.

Sarah Michelle Gellar played a pop singer, but did not sing a song herself, but had Kim Wayman sing it. It took Jieho Lee and Bob DeRosa six years to complete the film.

criticism

The lexicon of the international film states: "More atmospherically dense than stringently told, the noir melodrama impresses with excellent actors and suggestive images for the existential oppression and the striving longing of its protagonists."

Jens Hamp from Filmstarts judged: “Due to the lively video clip production and the expected convincing actors,“ The Air I Breathe ”entertains at least superficially - but the deeper the view, the faster the shaky house of cards collapses. As if in a vacuum, Jieho Lee deprives his characters of all air to breathe, so that they gasp through the constructed plot like soulless ghosts. "

The editorial team of Computer Bild wrote that the film failed in US cinemas and was not even shown in German cinemas, “but it is better than the omens would suggest. The story, which sometimes seems a bit too constructed, has four storylines, "of which" hardly any of these storylines are really exciting enough to work individually. Overall, however, they develop their charm. ”Computerbild sums up:“ Despite all the criticism, the film works and remains interesting until the last plot point is resolved. ”Words of praise were found for Andy García in particular,“ the one as a mafia boss Fingers gives a perfect comeback idea ”.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Certificate of Release for The Air I Breathe - The Power of Fate . Voluntary self-regulation of the film industry , November 2008 (PDF; test number: 115 987 DVD).
  2. ↑ Locations according to the Internet Movie Database
  3. ↑ a b c d budget and box office results according to the Internet Movie Database
  4. ↑ a b c d Start dates according to the Internet Movie Database
  5. ↑ a b Background information according to the Internet Movie Database
  6. ↑ The Air I Breathe - The Power of Fate. In: Lexicon of International Films . Film service , accessed March 2, 2017 .Template: LdiF / Maintenance / Access used 
  7. ↑ Film starts : film review , Jens Hamp
  8. ↑ Computer image : Film review ( Memento of the original from December 16, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.computerbild.de