Mathias (Albert Schuch) works as a professional impersonator, in Bernhard Wenger’s acerbic social comedy. He steps in as the son of a successful businessman during a major event (since his real heir hates him), or as the fashionable boyfriend of a potential lodger desperately seeking to meet a diversity clause, or even as the exciting dad of a rich boy whose real father if bore. Clients can book Matthias to play the perfect spouse, academic offspring, or stand-in for argument practice. He has to meet various bourgeois expectations: a loving family, a prestigious job, political credentials, and the rights looks. The façade reinforces the social standards, creating a fast-growing customer base for Matthias.
The debut feature of the Austrian writer and director takes the idea of social performances to a literal extreme. Matthias runs an agency for curated social performances with his friend and business partner David (Anton Noori). He is the best-paid impersonator of the team. In an age where authenticity is a fashionable accessory and appearance is everything, Matthias has found his niche. Only, he might get a bit too comfortable in it. He’s proficient at being whoever his surroundings want him to be, yet struggles to be himself. The sudden breakup with his girlfriend Sophia (Julia Franz Richter) serves as a wake-up call.
At first, Sophia attempts coax a genuine reaction from Matthias, to no avail. A pony-sized Great Dane in their living room doesn’t elicit any particular reaction. Sophia walks out, after telling her ex that he doesn’t seem “real” anymore. So the crumbling protagonist desperately tries to become more grounded in the actual world. Matthias’s struggle to be true is both sad and comical. Personality is a social construct, it seems. His upper-middle class environment is defined by image.
Wenger got the idea for his screenplay from Japan’s recent surge in rent-a-friend services, as explored in Werner Herzog’s Family Romance, LLC (2020). The concept itself isn’t that new. Playing a girlfriend, wife, or business partner in official social settings is a standard service offered in escorting. But the professional impersonators go one step further, at times enacting an entire scenario on their own. In one such example, Matthias defends an elderly couple against young troublemakers. The objective is to feign civil courage. The action gets increasingly weird, leaving audiences wondering what’s real and what’s not.
The plot is funny and wry, mostly thanks to Schuh’s fantastic performance. Wenger doesn’t go beyond that though, leaving viewers with a collection of loosely assembled vignettes. The glossy images, the dull music score and some polished performances feel a little hackneyed and clean. The dialogue is not as amusing as it’s supposed to be, and the social commentary remains largely flat. The film insists that paid companionship and social mimicry are psychologically damaging, without ever revealing what a “true” personality entails. Overall, this is a promising debut that only partly achieves its objectives.
Peacock is in the Official Competition of Tiff Romania 20205.
