Amour fou
Berlin, the middle of the Romantic Era. The young poet Heinrich von Kleist wants to overcome the inevitability of death through true love. Bored of this earthly existence and the banality of everyday life, he looks for a companion who will commit suicide with him out of love. His attempts to convince his cousin, Marie, who is extremely skeptical of the poet’s original proposition (would you be interested in taking your own life along with me?), are unsuccessful. However, Heinrich meets Henriette, a simple woman who is married to a businessman he knows. Henriette is convinced of her feelings for the poet, but, at first, she lacks the courage to agree to his suggestion of mutual suicide. The situation changes when she learns that she is suffering from an incurable disease. Amour Fou is a very theatrical film with carefully crafted, static shots, but thanks to its style, this peculiar romantic comedy (as the director herself calls it) is absurdly funny.
Katarzyna Wolanin
Jessica Hausner
Jessica Hausner was born in 1972 in Vienna. She studied Direction at the Filmacademy Vienna. In 1999, she founded a production company called Coop99 along with Barbara Albert, Antonin Svoboda, and Martin Gschlacht. Her first full-length feature films, Lovely Rita and Hotel, premiered at the festival in Cannes. For Lourdes, shewon a FIPRESCI at the festival in Venice and the Grand Prix in Warsaw.
Selected filmography
2001 Lovely Rita
2004 Hotel
2009 Lourdes
2014 Szalona miłość / Amour fou