Schlaf Illness (2011)

Directed by: Ulrich Kohler | 91 minutes | drama | Actors: Pierre Bokma, Jean-Christophe Folly, Jenny Schily, Hippolyte Girardot, Maria Elise Miller, Sava Lolov, Francis Noukiatchom, Ali Mvondo Roland, Isacar Yinkou

It’s dark in Dark Africa. A fact that director Ulrich Köhler repeatedly emphasizes in his film ‘Schlafkrankheit’. The film opens with only the faint glow of a car’s headlights in the pitch darkness of the night. The car with three European occupants is arrested. Two African men in uniform ask for their papers. There is uncertainty about the need for a visa, whether or not to give some bribes. Then the ease with which the officer stretches his uniform to allow him to drive along and a pinch of predictive suicidal insanity when protagonist Ebbo Velten, played by Pierre Bokma, puts the police officer’s gun to his head, after the officer assured him that the gun is not loaded.

Welcome to Africa, director Ulrich Köhler lets us know here. An inscrutable continent. The lights don’t come on until the family arrives at their beautiful doctor’s home, where the main characters of the first part of the film are bathed in electric light.

Köhler’s film can be divided into two parts. In the first half, the story is told from the perspective of physician and development worker Ebbo Velten. Ebbo is about to finish his work and return to Germany with his family. Ebbo is busy handing over his work, but it becomes clear to the viewer that he is not eager to return to the Europe where he no longer feels at home. Ebbo feels like a fish in water in Africa or perhaps more accurately a hippocampus… (…a detail that will become clear as the film progresses).

This first part is the strongest part of the film. The problem is outlined quite clearly and the actors are given the space to play their roles. Pierre Bokma plays his role quite loosely and seems to complement the lack of stage directions with a good dose of his own charm.

In the second part, we switch to Alex Nzila, a young doctor with an African background. Alex leaves Paris to evaluate Dr. Ebbo Velten’s project. The film now has a high ‘Heart of Darkness’ quality, and that’s where things go a bit wrong. Bokma suddenly becomes a kind of Kurtz who is hiding somewhere in the jungle with an investigation into an African sleeping sickness that got out of hand. Ebbo becomes a shadowy figure that Alex only catches after a lot of effort. Ebbo is not at the agreed place, no one really knows where he is or when he will be back, and when he appears mysteriously for a moment, he disappears immediately after an argument with a pregnant African girl.

To emphasize the overall sense of alienation of both characters, the narrative structure is fragmented. Scenes stop halfway through, leaving the viewer with a question each time. However, this narrative form is counterproductive with ‘Schlafkrankhet’, the wafer-thin story no longer gains body. Add to that the fact that Pierre Bokma doesn’t get much to work with, except to feel displaced, and the conclusion is that ‘Schlafkrankeit’ is ultimately unsatisfactory.

‘Schlafkrankheit’ is not a movie to fall asleep to; it gives an interesting insight into the world of development workers in opaque sub-Saharan Africa and sometimes contains beautiful pictures, but otherwise it remains somewhat mediocre. Director Ulrich Köhler could have shed a little more light in the darkness.