IFFR 2025
30 Jan – 9 Feb 2025

Frost

IFFR 1998

tiger competition

203'
Germany
1997

Frost is a film that makes no attempt to fit into the parameters of category of fiction, documentary or experimental. It is a heartfelt reaction towards living in an environment and conveying what is perceived there. Drama seems to unfold in real time, we are intimately present as what we see jumps back and forth between representation and reality- between acting and being.The story of a woman and a child leaving the disturbed relationship with a man / father to wander through a mental and physical German landscape of simultaneous insecurity, darkness and potential, is extremely simple. Ultimately it is the meditation upon time, relationships, perceptions and values of human character that matters.Those who have seen Fred Kelemen's Verhängnis (1994), a film about the seamy side of the big city populated by illegal immigrants and prostitutes, can picture the existential gloom in FROST. The frozen atmosphere is not only evoked by the length of the film (203 minutes) but also by the long shots. The hyper realistic acting causes an oppresive feeling that will last for a long time.Kelemen regards the screening of this version, unlike the unfinished version that was screened at the festival in Berlin, as the real world premiere of Frost.

Fred Kelemen

IFFR 1998

tiger competition