Afire (2023)

Here in the third week of July, when fully 90% of the moviegoing public is going to give their love to The Barbenheimer (I did), it’s unlikely that any will pass them up for a quiet character-study from Germany about a potential loser and his friends trapped by a wild fire.  This is the film that is worth seeking out, however.  It is a strange film, effective and a little haunting.

If you know the world of Christian Petzold, then this should not come as a surprise.   Afire is the second of a planned four-part quadrilogy set against the elements.  His previous 2020 film Undine had a theme of water.  Afire has a theme of . . . well, fire.  The tone is the same – ambient noise, and long spaces between dialogue; faces look onward and out into the horizon.  There are lives that have been stalled.

Afire begins with two young men, Leon (Thomas Schubert) and Felix (Langston Uibel), who are vacationing on The Baltic coast at a beach house owned by Felix’s mother.  There’s an approaching wildfire eating up the landscape but they apparently don’t think that it is close enough to be a problem despite the helicopters that fly overhead, the empty hotels in town, and a loudspeaker announces that barbecuing, camping and smoking have been banned.  

Either way, it sets the scene as this overcast, windy landscape seems to promise an approaching storm.  Why are Leon and Felix staying?  Why aren’t they more alarmed by this?  One might ask as they stand on the roof of the house and watch the hellish red glow of the wildfires on the horizon.  I think Petzold is suggesting the moment in our lives, in our 20s, when we thought we were bulletproof; when death seemed to be someone else’s problem.  The future is ahead.  What could go wrong?

Yes, the fires loom, but they aren’t nearly as interesting as what is going on between Leon and Felix.  We’re not sure of the nature of their relationship, but whatever friendly bond they have is tinged with a sort of brotherly combativeness.  Felix is part-Jamaican and is working on a portfolio that he hopes will get him into art school.  This theme: water.  “That’s not a theme,” Leon tells him.  Leon is sullen, downtrodden and always looks like he’s waiting for someone to give him credit for something.  

Leon is our focus.  He’s unremarkable, doughy, irritable, defensive and a little lazy.  He has written a second novel that is terrible – he knows it – and worse his publisher is coming to read it.  He wears this anticipation on his face like a kid is school waiting for the bully to come around the corner.  What resides in his mind is always unsettled because it is always on the end of his nose – we can see it.  He directs his general insecurity on Felix who eventually makes it a habit to be anywhere that Leon is not – like the beach.  Eventually, the two are joined by Devid (Enno Trebs), a local lifeguard, and Nadja (Paula Beer), a seasonal worker. 

Much of the movie stays with Leon, played by Austrian actor Thomas Schubert as the kind of guy that you would imagine might spends all of his time with potato chips, anime and video games.  He looks like a creature of the comic book variety and we think we know him right away.  It was an interesting choice to focus on this character.  In most movies, he’d be the third-tier focus and the lovely Nadja would get most of the screentime, but Petzold is more interested in what is going on inside Leon’s overstuffed mind.  As a writer, he’s his own worse enemy and he’s not much more than that as a person.  He’s snappish, defensive and often clueless.

Nadja is played by Paula Beer, the veteran of Petzold’s films.  We aren’t introduced to her right away – we hear her through the wall having sex with Devid first.  When we meet her, she catches us off-guard.  She has a willowy form and a smile that is like the sun coming out.  She sees right through Leon’s bullshit and he’s captivated by her.  When she asks to read his work, he snaps at her and her face bear’s real pain.  When she does read it, her body language wears the same frame that most people had seeing The Phantom Menace for the first time – disappointed and hurt because she knows it can be better.  There is always a distance between Nadja and Leon.  His body language dances around lust and desire and passion, while she wears a wall of sisterly distancing – she’s just not that into him.

Bound in close quarters, the temperature of this quartet of characters is matched by the fire that is approaching.  It’s not what you expect.  Petzold is too smart to allow his film to get soaked in easy theatrics.  Afire may seem a little too passive for some, but there are surprises in store for those dedicated to what he has to say.  I was genuinely surprised at where the movie was going.  There’s more than a wildfire afoot here.  Petzold is brilliant at letting moments breathe, letting us wonder what his characters are thinking and feeling.  They’re not always likable, or at least not lovable, and that’s a relief.