Or "The Warrior and the Princess"
Released October 2000. Directed by Tom Tykwer, Starring: Franka Potente, Benno Furmann.
OK...Sunday mornings I get to sleep in and watch all the silly, sappy, artsy movies (good or bad) that I want since Frank works, and I have the TV all to myself! It's a beautiful time. This AM however there's a free preview weekend and we got IFC ( The Independent Film Channel) and I saw one that's going to stick with me for awhile.
It's German...need I go further?
OK...It's German and it's good! That's a new one for me. Since most of the time when I think of German art films.. I have a flashback of Dieter and his monkey from Saturday Night Live.
Here's a brief synopsis: A psychiatric nurse at a mental ward is injured in an accident that is caused by a man who's running away from a robbery. He saves her life, and there's an incredibly intimate moment where he has to give her an emergency tracheotomy ( I know it has the potential to be gross)..but it's not it's sweet. When she recovers...she's obsessed with finding this mysterious man who literally gave her his breath and dissapeared. She feels she may only have the chance to be happy with him.
She's altered from the incident and doesn't know why he saved her. She questions her existence and wonders if she needs to change since she's been given this new life.
The man is a very troubled ex-soldier, who has had a previous tragedy involving his wife and an explosion at a gas station. He's pretty crazy, actually...and he and a friend of his from the army are planning a bank job. Things don't go as planned needless to say and the nurse who has been following her savior intervenes and changes both of their paths forever.
I loved this movie!...it's strange, sweet, poignant, very German and utterly foreign. It ends well...very well for all the impending tragedy just around the corner. I highly recommend it if you have a spare afternoon and are looking for a romance story that doesn't resemble any other romance you've ever seen.
Danke Schoen.
It's worthy of four out of five "geld puffmais" in my book.
