The American (2010)

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Movie
German title The American
Original title The American
Country of production United States
original language English
Publishing year 2010
length 104 minutes
Age rating FSK 12
JMK 14
Rod
Director Anton Corbijn
script Rowan Joffe
production Anne Carey,
Jill Green,
Ann Wingate,
Grant Heslov ,
George Clooney
music Herbert Grönemeyer
camera Martin calm
cut Andrew Hulme
occupation
synchronization

The American is an American film directed by Anton Corbijn from 2010.

action

A gun builder and contract killer, who calls himself Jack and otherwise Edward, kills two killers targeted at him in the Swedish province of Dalarna and his uninvolved girlfriend who witnessed the exchange of fire. He travels by train to Rome, where he meets his client Pavel, who sends him by car to Castelvecchio in Abruzzo , where he is supposed to go into hiding. After a short tour of the place, however, he travels on to Castel del Monte, about 25 km to the east . He throws away the cell phone given by Pavel and from then on communicates with him via a telephone booth.

Shortly after his arrival, he received an order from Pavel to make a special long gun for a colleague, Mathilde . During his stay, he met the Catholic priest of the community and fell in love with the prostitute Clara, whose services he regularly used. Clara begins to reciprocate Jack's feelings over time. During a joint shooting exercise on a river in a wooded area, Mathilde tests the weapon that has been made, but still has a wish for improvement. Jack can kill a persecutor who is alleged to avenge the Swedish dead. The priest friend suspects that Jack has something to do with the killing and admonishes him to leave the sinful life behind. During a picnic with Clara by a river, Jack briefly believes that she wants to murder him because she has a gun with her. However, Clara only has the gun in her handbag because she is afraid of a serial killer who's after prostitutes while she is working. Jack then plans a future together with Clara and therefore announces to Pavel that he is leaving after the job has been completed. Mathilde is instructed by Pavel to kill Jack when handing over the weapon. However, there is no way for her to liquidate Jack immediately after the delivery, which is why she pretends to say goodbye, but follows Jack.

When the hit man tries to shoot him with the said gun during a procession , the gun that Jack manipulated backfires and she falls seriously injured from the roof. Jack hands Clara the envelope with the fee Mathilde paid and tells her to wait for him at the river. Jack learns from the dying Mathilde that Pavel has commissioned her with his murder. A little later, Pavel appears to kill Jack himself. Jack shoots him, but is wounded himself in the exchange of fire, which he only notices on the drive to the meeting point agreed with Clara. Once there, he collapses over the steering wheel.

background

Sulmona ( Abruzzo ): Corso Ovidio

The scenes set in Sweden were shot in Östersund . In Sulmona , the scenes were created in the Italian café where Jack and Mathilde meet for the first time, as well as the scenes at the train station from which Jack picks them up at the second meeting. The other scenes were shot in Rome and Castel del Monte . The population of 129 in the Italian village of Castel del Monte doubled due to the temporary influx of people involved in the shooting. Filming began on 28 September 2009 and ended in November 2009. The budget of the film is 20 million dollars estimated. The film had its world premiere on September 1, 2010 in the USA , Canada and Kazakhstan . On 10 September 2010 he was the Dutch film by the Sea - Film Festival shown. The film was shown in German and Swiss cinemas from September 16, 2010, and one day later in Austria. This was followed by screenings at the Festival do Rio on September 25, 2010 and at the Belgrade Film Festival on March 5, 2011. In the USA, the film grossed over 35.5 million US dollars, including more than 16.6 million US dollars on Opening weekend.

From Universal Studios , the film was on February 24, 2011 in Germany DVD releases. The German DVD of the film has had an FSK-16 logo printed on it since its release. However, this is due to the trailer of the film Twelve contained on the DVD , as the film and its trailer are approved for ages 16 and up. The main film The American , however, corresponds to the theatrical version released for ages 12 and up.

The American is the second film by star photographer Anton Corbijn after the 2007 film Control . The novel A Very Private Gentleman was written by Martin Booth . The German first edition of the novel was published by Rowohlt Verlag in 2010 under the title The American .

The pistol Jack uses is a Walther PPK , which is also used in James Bond films. As a homage to James Bond 007 , the combination 014 was chosen for the combination lock of the rifle case as a duplication of the number sequence 007 .

The soundtrack was composed by Herbert Grönemeyer , who first produced the music for a movie for the 1983 Spring Symphony and was known as a neighbor in London with Anton Corbijn. The 25-track soundtrack was released on September 17, 2010 by EMI . In addition, in the scene in which Jack is sitting alone in the Bar del Monte , the music title Tu vuò fà l'americano ( You pretend to be American ) can be heard based on the film title . Later on, the Italian-American Spaghetti Western game, The Song of Death, published in 1968, can be seen there on television.

There is a recurring butterfly symbolism in the film . Jack wears a butterfly tattoo, reads a book about butterflies and is called Signore Farfalla (Italian butterfly ) by Mathilde and Clara . In addition, butterflies can be seen in various scenes, including the final sequence in which a butterfly previously described as an endangered species flies away. In the scene in which Jack is having dinner with the priest, music from the Italian opera Madama Butterfly by Giacomo Puccini can be heard.

German dubbed version

The German synchronous editing was done by Berliner Synchron AG Wenzel Lüdecke in Berlin . The synchronous direction was carried out by Christian Schneider.

actor German speaker role
George Clooney Detlef Bierstedt Jack / Edward
Violante Placido Victoria Storm Clara
Irina Björklund Andrea Solter Ingrid
Thekla Reuten Anna Carlsson Mathilde
Paolo Bonacelli Uli Krohm Father Benedetto
Johan Leysen Reinhard Kuhnert Pavel

criticism

Deniz Sertkol of independentfilme.com said: “The actors [are] not to blame [sic!] For the mediocrity of The American . Certainly the cozy village atmosphere paired with the thriller plot forms a productive symbiosis and gives the film the necessary tension. But Control is completely lacking in spirit. What remains is a visually appealing and well-cast film, which may arouse travel bug, but because of the outdated acting plot does not live up to Corbijn's expectations. "

Jan Schulz-Ojala from Tagesspiegel praised the pictures of the “post-post-modern spaghetti western”: “The remote and barren mountain villages [are] captured in the most exquisite way possible.” The film impresses with its “picturesque ambience”, but leaves “above all tension and one solid story ”. Schulz-Ojala finds positive words for the portrayal of Violante Placido , “but the essential question for a thriller 'Who against whom and why?' remains in the vague ”.

Andreas Kötter from ProSieben called the film “a masterpiece” and speaks of a “great George Clooney”. The American is a “fascinating thriller melodrama” whose plot “does not necessarily shine with great originality”, but whose cinematic implementation is convincing with “taciturn images that are characterized by creeping slowness”. The portrayal of Clooney is "great", because with "economical means" Clooney succeeds in conveying the dichotomy of his role "extremely intensely". George Clooney should therefore be mentioned “in the same breath” as Alain Delon and Steve McQueen .

Susan Vahabzadeh from the Süddeutsche Zeitung found The American was “a taciturn film, with a score by Herbert Grönemeyer.” She went on to say, “Small gestures, inconspicuous looks, the fear that flashes past on a face - all of this unfolds its true ones Effect only in pictures on the verge of standstill. ”“ That doesn't mean that this story doesn't develop any tension: it just does it infinitely more artfully than is currently the Hollywood standard, where action and suspense are constantly confused. Corbijn relies on small stimuli, a pursuer you never really see, a faint, permanent sense of threat, ”summed up Vahabzadeh. "Corbijn stages it as if he wanted to prove with how little history, dialogue, emotional outbursts one can generate it, a lesson in minimalism", concluded Vahabzadeh.

Awards

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Certificate of Release for The American . Voluntary self-regulation of the film industry , August 2010 (PDF; test number: 124 145 K).
  2. ^ Age rating for The American . Youth Media Commission .
  3. ↑ a b c Filming locations according to the Internet Movie Database
  4. ↑ a b c d e f g Background information according to the Internet Movie Database
  5. ↑ a b c Budget and box office results according to the Internet Movie Database
  6. ↑ a b c d Start dates according to the Internet Movie Database
  7. ^ Certificate of Approval for The American . Voluntary self-regulation of the film industry, December 2010 (PDF; test number: 124 145 V).
  8. ↑ a b c The American. In: synchronkartei.de. German synchronous index , accessed on March 19, 2013 .
  9. ↑ Film review ( Memento of the original from September 2, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , Deniz Sertkol, August 29, 2010. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / independentfilme.com
  10. ↑ Jan Schulz-Ojala: "The American": George Clooney's first erotic thriller . In: Der Tagesspiegel , September 16, 2010.
  11. ^ ProSieben : film review , Andreas Kötter.
  12. ↑ Susan Vahabzadeh: One Last Look at Life . In: Süddeutsche Zeitung , September 15, 2010, accessed on October 2, 2013.
  13. ↑ Nominations and awards according to the Internet Movie Database