Germany’s Christoph Hochhäusler, the acclaimed director of “Till The End of The Night” which premiered at the 2023 Berlin Film Festival, returns with his latest film, “Death Will Come.” The crime piece is set to debut at the Locarno Film Festival, produced by Heimatfilm in collaboration with Amour Fou Luxembourg and Tarantula.
Sold by Italy’s True Colors, the film sees Tez, a hitwoman played by Sophie Verbeeck (“All about Them,”), tasked to avenge the death of a crime boss’s courier. The boss (Louis-Do de Lencquesaing) who hired her has motives more nuanced than they seem.
Tez remains an enigma, with the story only scratching the surface of what makes her tick as she goes about her work. For Hochhäusler, the mystery is intentional. “I believe spectator and character must meet. As a spectator, I am usually willing to go to greater lengths, investing in the fiction so to speak, if the better part of a character stays in the dark,” he shared, emphasizing the delicate balance required in storytelling.
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“Tez as a character is venturing further into fiction than any of my previous characters. I think Sophie Verbeeck infuses her with just enough reality that we can accept her as a human being while keeping her ‘aura of myth’ intact. So yes, I enjoy intrigue and hope the audience will, too.”
The film departs from the typical glamor and violence of the crime genre, focusing instead on the stress and toll of a criminal life. “What I love about genre cinema is how it constantly recalibrates our relation towards reality. The gangster film especially is always torn between bigger than life and closer to life,” he reflected. “In the 1930s, Warner Bros. gangster films were considered ‘gritty’ and ‘real.’ At the same time, the films were highly stylized, almost operatic. But gritty operatic. Think of Cagney in ‘Public Enemy’ William Wellman, 1931) or ‘The Roaring Twenties’ (Raoul Walsh, 1939).”
The director’s appreciation for New Hollywood’s renegotiation of this balance is clear. Films like Robert Altman’s ‘The Long Goodbye’ with Elliot Gould, Dustin Hoffman in ‘Straight Time’ (Ulu Grosbard), and Michael Mann’s ‘80s neo-noir “Thief,” are particularly dear to him. “In our small ways, we tried something similar. Tez does not buy cat food (like Eliott Gould), but accepts that the gangster she has abducted eats gluten-free,” he said.
His collaboration with novelist Ulrich Peltzer, a frequent writing partner, continues to evolve. This time, they wrote in one go during a work holiday near Cologne, starting with a different story idea and allowing Tez’s character to guide the narrative. “It is a lot of fun to write with Ulrich, never routine,” he noted.
A trope of critics with any group of new directors in the same area at the same time, and who share traits is to label them; the ‘Berlin School’ was the moniker applied to Hochhäusler alongside directors such as Angela Schanelecand Christian Petzold.
“The Berlin School label came from outside, from the critics. I’d argue that the stylistic diversity within this loose group was always bigger than its reputation.” His own path is leading towards a more direct cinema, and a desire to surprise both himself and others. “We are working on a psycho horror film, a WWII period drama and a hard-to-categorize film about childhood memories. I’d love to do a Western, a science fiction and a comedy one day,” he revealed.
Brussels, with its unique ambiance, was always envisioned as the perfect setting for his “semi-glamorous” crime story. “I fell in love with Brussels when I first visited the city, and immediately wanted to make a film there. This film would not exist without the strange beauty of this town,” he explained. “I really like Brussels’ contrasts, the architecture, the dirt under the nails. I’d love to return for a film set in the world of European politics.”
“Death Will Come” premieres in competition at Locarno on Aug. 8.
