I found this film unsettling and unsatisfying--but that is exactly the point! For it deals with a character so flawed, one must accept the uncomfortable reality that these profound personal deficits will never (realistically) be resolved.Which leads the husband to ask the pivotal question in the entire film: "But is it enough?" Clearly he is in great pain as he wrestles with this quandary in which he finds himself stuck.Max married this woman who APPEARED to be a highly successful, beautiful woman physician. But marrying across different cultural lines can be tricky to ascertain authentic personality vs. unfamiliar social customs. When newly in love, we have a blind spot to deficits in our partner and easily rationalize them away.Sadly, this woman's actions--and subsequent reactions--reveal her personality has suffered from arrested development. She is a Narcissist who doesn't care how her actions affect those who love her. Gratifying her ego trumps all other considerations.She never makes ONE display of empathy or compassion--not once does she even frown or show appropriate discomfort (while her husband cries in bed..). Her affect and behavior are HIGHLY abnormal. (Also, note that she is NOT primarily a clinical MD, but rather a researcher; this has allowed her deficit in compassion to slip through the cracks).It's a social statement on how highly we value physical beauty and academic achievement--so much we might miss the person inside is incompletely formed(!).In the final scenes, her husband realizes the extent of her deficits and must weigh two traumatic alternatives: leaving her (mother of his three children) or staying with her (denying him a compassionate, sensitive partner he desperately wants and needs). It's a very grim prospect for Max, and he knows it. Coming from a traditional Indianbackground, I infer that he will choose to stay with her for the sake of children and social pressure.The film leaves us somehow feeling "ripped off" and unsatisfied as viewers--but this is by design because they mirror Max's reality. There will be no resolution of the core problem, only a lifetime of painful coping. Ultimately, he will have to decide if indeed "it is enough"---or not.

As usual, I know nothing but the title (and sometimes who's in it) of the films I'm gonna watch, not even genre, but with this one, I also saw the poster. These days, everything about movies is hugely predictive and spoilerish, so with a title like this, I could sense that it would be a drama, and quite frankly, because of the poster and the likeness of Hüller with Williams, I thought: Aha, some good American Indie drama.Well, turns out I wasn't too far off, as this was definitely not some mainstream BS for the multiplexes.Brownian Movement is a very slow study in the exposure of the dark side of a perfectly well adjusted (and I hate that phrase, well-adjusted, there's something terribly Nazi-Orwellian about it) successful medical doctor. The title refers to the phenomenon that molecules in fluids in states of rest still keep moving very slowly. To give you an impression of how slow the movie is, the first shot of the movie is a static shot of a very nice upscale apartment, about a minute long, which is long, if not an eternity, in this age of attention deficit disorders.It's a film in three episodes and it opens with Charlotte, a very pretty Berlin medical doctor renting an apartment in Brussels, Belgium, the city where she works and lives with her husband, an architect, and their only child.As it appears, Charlotte rented the apartment in order to have sex with other men, varying from the average to the highly unattractive and obese. Everything is OK, until Charlotte accidentally meets one of her lovers at her husbands place of work and she gets such a fit that she faints. In part two, she goes into therapy (for this?), sometimes even with her husband, while her precise condition is never clearly stated. Eventually, her medical license is revoked (which seems fascist to me, you can get your medical license revoked for sleeping around?? Or, it might be that some of her lovers were her patients as well), and in part three, she, her husband and son, and some new children (twins) are now living in India, where the film ends.Brownian movement is an extremely understated movie, with sometimes breathtaking cinematography, comprised mostly of static shots. The only moving shots are when the camera is in a car. Otherwise, the film is rather like leafing through someones photo book, with only shots of Charlotte in it. This might be a weakness, the medium is after all, film aka "dem movin' pitchers", and it would be a good thing to have at least some attempt at panning (sweeping) camera shots. The acting, also by the underused Bakema is superb. And of course it's very pleasing to watch the very attractive Hüller, who really does look like Michelle Williams' almost twin sister.Many things remain unclear, like who is Isaac, in what language do Charlotte and Max declare their love for one another after love making, (it's not English, French or German) and why does Charlotte sleep with all these rather ugly, gross looking men? I mean, obese hairy guy? WTF? About that, it's nice that the movie doesn't attempt any explanations, other than Charlotte's remark that sleeping with those men and sleeping with her husband are two things which aren't related at all, and that giving an explanation would make things much worse. But it does make one curious. Then again, with movies like these, the room for discussion it leaves, will tell you much about the person you're going to see the movie with ....;)The biggest question of the movie is, (and what I'm really curious about) if Michelle Williams knows that she has a German twin who is as good of an actress as she is, or better.8/10 The Melancholic Alcoholic.

This is an exceedingly fine film. It explores issues that arise when a marriage is put under a "pressure test" – through its exploration of cause and effect it raises the challenging question of 'what is the nature of marriage?' The issue is "what is enough?' as one of the characters asks. As the wife and husband cope with events the camera focuses on their faces for very long durations of time; this is done in total silence so we, the viewer, is given the luxury of having time to explore our own thoughts about the progress of the film, and how each character does (or one thinks, should) react.This film flies its 'Art House' flag with pride, being slow and low key (but beautifully set and filmed). It is a film in which deep thought has gone into its making, and to do it justice it deserves the same respect from the viewer. Watch it, and see if it gives you cause to ponder the significant issues that it raises.

I had no idea what this movie would be about. But it played at the Berlin International Film Festival this year and the title sounded intriguing. Plus it did fit into my schedule. It really goes all the way and is pretty harsh and raw. While you never really get into the head of our main actress, she seems to bear it all. So this isn't for the delicate viewers amongst us.Unfortunately it is not as good as I'd wish it would be. It tries very hard to be something poetic, something that will make you think about things. Philosophical even, if you want to call it that. And while it has really good points, it never achieves its goal.