Transit (2018)

Directed by: Christian Petzold | 101 minutes | drama | Actors: Franz Rogowski, Paula Beer, Godehard Giese, Lilien Batman, Maryam Zaree, Barbara Auer, Matthias Brandt, Sebastian Hülk, Emilie de Preissac, Antoine Oppenheim, Louison Tresaliet, Justus von Dohnányi, Alex Brendemühl, Trystan Pütter

‘Transit’ begins in media res, a literary term to indicate that you are in the middle of the story. Not surprising, since it is a novel adaptation. The reader knows that it is a narrative in which the events are later clarified. This principle also works very well in film; images may activate the plot even better than words – see ‘Trackless’.

Christian Petzold can tell a story. Yet he asks a few things of the viewer. This is how you expect a film start in Nazi-occupied France in a historical setting. That is partly true, but as soon as the German Georg (Franz Rogowski) hits the street, it is suddenly contemporary Marseille. It is certainly original, but does it work? Or rather, does it work in a way that we can understand?

A writer would say: I can think of what I want. Georg flees from a concentration camp to the south of France and finds shelter in the guest house of Marie (Paula Beer). This beautiful Frenchwoman falls for the lisping German and that is presented believably. The trademark of Petzold, who always manages to create chemistry without having to play violin music. Authentic drama, supercooled heartbeats, difficult circumstances, et cetera.

The doubt remains, especially with a voice-over – a trick to mask imperfections in the narration. But you remain hopeful about the role of the present in the story. Is this a kind of ‘English Patient’, a retelling? Or does the modern setting represent the viewer who places himself in the past through the narrator? We pause the film to read the Wiki of the 1944 war novel of the same name by Anna Seghers. The narrator there is Georg, that’s something, but otherwise Seghers’ ‘Transit’ seems to be a linear story.

Petzold himself appears to have devised the 21st century setting, with even timelessness as a starting point in the costuming; in the end, the mixture of past and present turns out to be a cerebral means for creating wonder. A contrived way to give shape to what is already worthwhile in itself, but needs a new look. Sometimes things don’t have to be explained perfectly, but that story-technical gap between the teeth is just what makes it moving.

The means, of course, serve a purpose. At Petzold it is always about identity issues. The journey to the south of France has different sequels in the past and present. That’s crazy, but not incomprehensible. In both cases, Georg takes the place of a deceased other in the life of his wife. Petzold seeks agreement between a concentration camp refugee from 1942 and immigrants in today’s Marseille, and with Georg as a connecting element he places this in the heart of the viewer.