Do join us for the first of our summer movies on Thursday, June 18, 2015, at 6:30 p.m. in the Parish Hall of Christ the King Lutheran Church, 2353 Rice Boulevard, Houston, TX 77005.
Der Mann, der ueber Autos sprang: Julian escapes from a Berlin psychiatric clinic with the desire to walk to southern Germany to atone for a friend’s death with the hope that this pilgrimage will heal that friend’s father who suffered a heart attack. Julian seems to have amazing clairvoyant abilities. Soon he is no longer alone. A young doctor, Juliane, conflicted by her work, leaves behind her boyfriend and job, and joins him, as does a frustrated housewife, Ruth. This road movie for walkers leads from northeast Berlin to southwest Baden-Wuerttemberg through a German no-man’s land. Meanwhile, a stressed and scruffy police detective is following them by car, trying to catch Julian to bring him back to the psychiatric ward.
Even though the beginning frames of the movie – clouds in time lapse – evoke film work by Werner Herzog, a German movie director and producer, and the subject of the movie seems to echo an incident in Herzog’s life when he walked from Munich to Paris in 1974 in the firm conviction that this would save the ailing film historian Lotte Eisner. Julian, too, undertakes his hike as a catharsis and as a pilgrimage, because he believes he caused his friend’s death; he hopes that he can save that friend’s father. However, where Herzog recounted his march as a “grim travelogue,” this movie is a lighter fare and full of hope.
Julian’s escape from the psychiatric hospital is the dawn of a free life for him, and the road trip is a “Bildungsreise” in the literary sense, a type of initiation. “Der Mann der ueber Autos sprang” is a road movie without a car. Each of the wanderers brings his own burden that he or she must and will overcome on this trip, and in the end, Julian actually does jump over a moving car. Some of the critics have compared this quest to the search for Heart, Courage, and Intellect in the magical world of Oz. It is a humorous, cheerful hike.
Enjoy this fascinating movie (in German with English subtitles) with us! We’ll have our usual food and beverage reception at 6:30 p.m. Registration will begin at 6:15 p.m., the movie at 7:00 p.m. Meeting fees are $10 for members, $5 for students, and $15 for nonmembers, regardless of whether you participate in the reception. Ample parking is available on the Rice University parking lot off Greenbriar Street for $1, credit cards only. Please respond now to angelika@houstonleipzig.org to let us know that you’ll be attending on Thursday, June 18, 2015.