Tom Tykwer Overview

Twenty minutes to collect 100,000 deutsche marks. Pulsating techno. Whip pans and fast edits. A fiery heroine with dyed-red hair frantically running to save her boyfriend's life. "The initial idea was an image," says 34-year-old director Tom Tykwer. "The image of... [more]

Twenty minutes to collect 100,000 deutsche marks. Pulsating techno. Whip pans and fast edits. A fiery heroine with dyed-red hair frantically running to save her boyfriend's life. "The initial idea was an image," says 34-year-old director Tom Tykwer. "The image of a woman running." This apparently ordinary idea leads to a veritable explosion of multiple images in his "Run Lola Run," one of the most highly praised films to come out of the new Berlin-centered German art scene. The film follows Lola through three different scenarios, each altered slightly by certain fortuitous events. In each episode, Tykwer toys with the idea of chaos theory in order to explore the fragility of reality. Drawing upon a variety of sources, "Run Lola Run" recalls the constructive Cubism of Picasso and Braque -- collages that used newspapers and other materials from daily life. Tykwer also incorporates many elements from pop culture: cartoons, techno music (which he composed for the film), the split screen. The aesthetic is one lifted from MTV, and with such dazzling technical feats, it is a marvel that Tykwer is completely self-taught. The three films he made prior to "Lola" reveal the same tendency to mix genres and allow chance association, even chaos, to guide the development of plot. "Die T'dliche Maria" (1994) probes the inner life of an unassuming housewife, passing from Bergmanesque existentialism to psychological thriller in the process. "Winterschl'fer" (1997) mixes tropes from noir, action, and melodrama as it follows the search of a group of thirtysomethings for pre-mid-life-crisis meaning. And in "Das Leben ist eine Baustelle" (1997) a young slaughterhouse worker whose life falls apart overnight latches on to a street musician named Vera, who may or may not provide salvation. The energy and verve Tykwer brings to his films seem an expression of the new Berlin and the burgeoning sense of endless possibilities that streams from that revived capitol. With its two halves united, Germany as a whole promises to send a new series of messages to the world, marrying chaos and optimism. [show less]