Alps-Alpeis (2011)

Directed by: Yorgos Lanthimos | 93 minutes | drama | Actors: Aris Servetalis, Johnny Vekris, Ariane Labed, Aggeliki Papoulia, Stavros Psyllakis

In a short time, Yorgos Lanthimos has developed into a European author that is taken into account by film lovers worldwide. After the sublime and terrifying ‘Dogtooth’ (‘Kynodontas’ (2009)), with which the Greek was successful in Cannes and garnered an Oscar nomination, successor ‘Alps’ is everything you hope to get from such a talent. In the same nasty sectarian atmosphere as its predecessor, the drama moves under the skin and manages to maintain its fascinating suspense until the end.

‘Alps’ doesn’t want to be as twisting and extreme as ‘Dogtooth’, but in a subtle way the film explores the themes that were raised there. The bizarre family has now been exchanged for an organization that arranges replacements for deceased people. A premise as lurid as Charlie Kaufman-esque, but Lanthimos chooses his own path and pushes his characters to the limit, almost allowing them to embrace the madness through brief moments of intense (verbal) violence and sex.

The way in which the characters in ‘Alps’ bring their dialogues are reminiscent of the late work of the master director Jean-Luc Godard. It seems without inspiration, but this is appearance; behind the faces that seem to contain no human characteristic, there is a large dose of tension. It is Lanthimos’s gift that this becomes palpable, increasingly towards the end, in which – harassing as his aforementioned French predecessor – he deliberately does not tie the strings completely together and his characters unhappy – but otherwise alive in their misery – leaves behind.

It is this understanding of the human brain – implied in the strong screenplay – and the fascinating way in which it is portrayed by cinematographer Christos Voudouris, that proves that Lanthimos is the forerunner in a new wave of great European filmmakers. Exciting, disturbing and at times terrifying is ‘Alps’; an immensely bleak game brought under great control by a new master.