Ins Leere

A description of a day in the life of the 'Sisters of Bethania'. The only convent of this small, contemplative congregation of Dominicans in Austria is situated in the rural remoteness of the village of Nestelbach, near Graz (Styria). Today there are eleven sisters living in a former country-castle, following the determination of their order in strict cloisterly regularity. Significant for the mystic-contemplative existence of the Bethanians are the vivid, daily mechanics and the ritualized form of their life, the sequence and the systematics of practice, introspection, (keeping) silence, change and return of the hourly prayers, of the times of daily work and chores in the house and garden and the silent presence in the chapel.

A fearless Antigone, refusing to allow the dishonored body of her murdered brother Polynices to be devoured by vultures and dogs, defies the Thebian tyrant Creon by burying him.

The film tries to retain the memory, the compulsion and the nostalgia of a text by Marguerite Duras.

Grainy Super 8 images, viridescent light, pale colors, the voice of Sylvie Rohrer reverberating as if transmitted by phone. And a few of Marguerite Duras’ thoughts are conveyed, about what women would need and what men do need.

The film is based on the eponymous 1960 novel by author Peter Weiss. In this autobiographical text, the author describes the years of his childhood and youth in Germany in the 20s and 30s as well as the flight of his half-Jewish family from persecution by the Nazis. This odyssey also portrays the young first-person narrator’s struggle for his artistic existence, as he was striving to establish himself as a painter and writer. In a free, sensual essay between fiction and document, realistic description and stylised invention, the film attempts to kindle today’s flame based on the past’s, and to create a new and vibrant third work from it. (Locarno Festival)