A WOMAN SCORNED
UNDINE Christian Petzold dives into the great underwater myth…
I The story of Undine is basically a simple one,” says writer/director Christian Petzold (Phoenix), doing his level best to bring Teasers up to speed on this classical European myth. For those who need a refresher, Undine is a water nymph who proffers herself to a lovelorn man. “She would come out of the water, naked and beautiful, and she would say, ‘I’m yours forever and ever,’ and he, of course, would be thrilled by that. But then she says to him, ‘There is only one caveat. If you ever leave me I will have to kill you!’”
Petzold was particularly inspired by Austrian poet Ingeborg Bachmann’s Undine Leaving, and he’s all too aware that he’s not the first artist to tackle this eternal myth. “That is a story that’s been told thousands and thousands of times. It’s the story of male projection. And even in the film with Michael Douglas and Glenn Close, Fatal Attraction, you can see that very story unfolding. They fuck around. And then she said, ‘Why would you want to leave me?’ And then she decides to kill him. Because she thought that she was the woman of his life.”
The German director’s twisted take, however, relocates the myth to modernday, where Undine (Paula Beer, who appeared in Petzold’s last film Transit) is working as a freelance guide for the Senate Administration for Urban Development in central Berlin, lecturing on the city’s architectural evolution. In the film’s first scene, she is dumped by her lover, who has met someone else, and threatens his life. But then she meets industrial diver Christoph (Franz Rogowski, another Transit alumni) and a romance blossoms, somewhat exploding the myth.
What emerges is a beguiling fantasy-romance that, like Bachmann’s version, tells the story from Undine’s point-of-view (and showcases an award-winning performance from Paula Beer, who was awarded Best Actress at last year’s Berlin Film Festival for her work here). Shooting the film was another matter entirely, with Petzold filming in Berlin’s famous Babelsberg Studios, using a huge tank to capture several quite remarkable underwater sequences when Christoph is at work in the dark, dank depths and Undine goes full nymph.
“We built a whole underwater world and got to see the beauty of it,” says Petzold. “And the actors also got to see the beauty of it. They were very much fascinated by this underwater world. And by the fact, of course, that they got to work for a couple of days without a director looking over their shoulder! They actually experienced a new form of physicality underwater and entirely without my influence.” Petzold was utterly delighted by this reaction. “That was one of the most beautiful moments of my work as a director.” JM
ETA | 2 APRIL / UNDINE OPENS IN TWO MONTHS.