“We are a typical dysfunctional German family,” announces Frieda (Elke Biesendorfer), the tattooed, pierced 17-year-old girl in Tom Tykwer’s ambitious new film, Das Licht (The Light). The opening night movie for this year’s Berlin International Film Festival, this is a fine choice as a curtain-raiser by incoming artistic director Tricia Tuttle, not least because it’s largely set in a rain-soaked Berlin. As Tuttle recently told Variety: “Filmmakers are noting that we live in a crazy, divisive world” – words that seem to entirely sum up The Light.
Tykwer, who writes and directs here, has never shied away from experimentation – think of Run Lola Run (1998), which never breaks sweat as Franka Potente sprints to save her boyfriend, or his collaboration with the Wachowskis, adapting the dystopian Cloud Atlas (2012). The Light comes at you like a locomotive in its early scenes, as the members of the Berlin-based Engels family go about their business. Frieda is out clubbing with her friends, taking illegal substances, while her twin brother Jon (Julius Gause) is in his bedroom, his VR goggles strapped on as he immerses himself into a sci-fi game called Transportal.
Meanwhile, their parents are going through issues. Mother Milena (Nicolette Krebitz) works in government, driving an initiative to fund a community theatre project in Kenya. Father Tim (Lars Eidinger) works for an activist group whose latest campaign – titled #Us – is about showing that the problems with the world are not caused by others, but ourselves. Milena also has a little boy, Dio (Elyas Eldridge), from a (presumably brief) affair with a Kenyan named Godfrey (Toby Onwumere), who now lives in Berlin and is forever on their doorstep, looking timid. Milena and Tim are in couples therapy with the hope that they’ll save their disjointed marriage.
Rarely, it seems, does the family ever spend any time together. But when their maid dies while cleaning their apartment – the crescendo of the film’s brilliant opening salvo – it leads to another coming into their lives. Farrah (Tala Al Deen) is a Syrian immigrant, a medical practitioner back in Aleppo who now must work as a housekeeper to make ends meet.
Farrah is first glimpsed in her apartment, facing a high-intensity LED lamp, which flashes bright lights into her face. Called the Lucia Lamp, it was developed in Austria by a psychotherapist and a neurologist as a form of therapy and Farrah is using it to overcome considerable trauma in her own life. What does she want with the Engels family? That only becomes clear in the operatic – and overblown – conclusion. But the idea that an Arabic-speaking woman comes to heal this western family feels patronising.
THE LIGHT
Director: Tom Tykwer
Starring: Tala Al Deen, Nicolette Krebitz, Lars Eidinger
Rating: 3/5
If that isn’t enough, Tykwer’s film also dabbles in VR – there is a remarkable scene where Jon and the girl he met online encounter each other in real life, then swirl about the streets like their avatars do in the nether regions of their shared Transportal game. And then, to top it all, the director goes full musical, with several song-and-dance sequences – from a gym workout number fronted by Eidinger to an airing of Queen’s seminal song Bohemian Rhapsody. Mamma mia, indeed.
With strong performances, especially from Al Deen, who brings dignity to her character – credit Tykwer for going out on a limb here – the film offers up a bold look at the chaos of 21st century living. A film about dysfunction – whether it’s in the home or a group like the United Nations, it’s a work that stumbles as much as it strides. But it’s a provocative and political piece, designed to make you look at the world in a way you haven’t before.
Das Licht premieres on Thursday at the Berlin International Film Festival
The specs
Engine: 2.0-litre 4cyl turbo
Power: 261hp at 5,500rpm
Torque: 405Nm at 1,750-3,500rpm
Transmission: 9-speed auto
Fuel consumption: 6.9L/100km
On sale: Now
Price: From Dh117,059
The specs
- Engine: 3.9-litre twin-turbo V8
- Power: 640hp
- Torque: 760nm
- On sale: 2026
- Price: Not announced yet
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Conflict, drought, famine
Estimates of the number of deaths caused by the famine range from 400,000 to 1 million, according to a document prepared for the UK House of Lords in 2024.
It has been claimed that the policies of the Ethiopian government, which took control after deposing Emperor Haile Selassie in a military-led revolution in 1974, contributed to the scale of the famine.
Dr Miriam Bradley, senior lecturer in humanitarian studies at the University of Manchester, has argued that, by the early 1980s, “several government policies combined to cause, rather than prevent, a famine which lasted from 1983 to 1985. Mengistu’s government imposed Stalinist-model agricultural policies involving forced collectivisation and villagisation [relocation of communities into planned villages].
The West became aware of the catastrophe through a series of BBC News reports by journalist Michael Buerk in October 1984 describing a “biblical famine” and containing graphic images of thousands of people, including children, facing starvation.
Band Aid
Bob Geldof, singer with the Irish rock group The Boomtown Rats, formed Band Aid in response to the horrific images shown in the news broadcasts.
With Midge Ure of the band Ultravox, he wrote the hit charity single Do They Know it’s Christmas in December 1984, featuring a string of high-profile musicians.
Following the single’s success, the idea to stage a rock concert evolved.
Live Aid was a series of simultaneous concerts that took place at Wembley Stadium in London, John F Kennedy Stadium in Philadelphia, the US, and at various other venues across the world.
The combined event was broadcast to an estimated worldwide audience of 1.5 billion.
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Quick pearls of wisdom
Focus on gratitude: And do so deeply, he says. “Think of one to three things a day that you’re grateful for. It needs to be specific, too, don’t just say ‘air.’ Really think about it. If you’re grateful for, say, what your parents have done for you, that will motivate you to do more for the world.”
Know how to fight: Shetty married his wife, Radhi, three years ago (he met her in a meditation class before he went off and became a monk). He says they’ve had to learn to respect each other’s “fighting styles” – he’s a talk it-out-immediately person, while she needs space to think. “When you’re having an argument, remember, it’s not you against each other. It’s both of you against the problem. When you win, they lose. If you’re on a team you have to win together.”
THE LIGHT
Director: Tom Tykwer
Starring: Tala Al Deen, Nicolette Krebitz, Lars Eidinger
Rating: 3/5
