The story takes place in the botanical gardens of an old German university. A towering gingko tree provides shelter, comfort and company to students and researchers from three very different eras. Silent Friend is the perfect companion piece to Mascha Schilinski’s The Sound of Falling (which premiered earlier this year in Cannes), another cryptic and visually spectacular German film about three distant generations of people brought together by something that outlives them all (a house in the case of Schilinski, and a tree here).
In 1908, the institution’s first ever female student Grete (Luna Wedler, who won the Best Actress Award) is overwhelmed by the diversity of plants, and the infinite possibilities ahead of her, in a world hitherto denied to those of her sex. In 1972, a loving couple of hippy, innocent students experiments with various species just as they also experiment with their own sexuality – their names are Hannes (Enzo Brumm) and Gundula (Marlene Burow). And in 2020, a Hong Kong scholar Tony Wong (Leung Chiu-Wai) studies the brain of human babies, and decides to try something very peculiar on the vary same tree, in the hope of establishing a link between the plant pulsations and our very own brain waves.
The three stories are carefully interspersed throughout the entire duration of this two-and-a-half movie. The texture of the images helps to distinguish the three plots. The oldest segment is in black and white, the second one has a vintage look with washed our colours and vaguely blurry backgrounds, while the most recent one is in the sharp and crisp cinema, the quality often associated with cutting-edge cinema technology (presumably an Arri Alexa camera, manufactured nearby in Munich).
This is a motion picture bursting with hyperrealism, while also flirting with the surreal and the abstract. It opens with an impressive image of a germinating ginkgo seed, captured with time-lapse technology. It looks like a mollusc seeking copulation or food. Microscopic images, as well as plant movement captured by various media provide the film with with extraordinary beauty. The extreme close-up of the curvaceous and sebaceous stems, leaves and flowers reveals the highly sexual nature of our “non-intelligent” friends. Some images are vaguely reminiscent of Robert Mapplethorpe’s pictures of flowers, if a lot more vivid. The difference is that the 69-year-old Hungarian filmmaker does not feature the our reproductive organs, also magnificent in their beauty. That is a real pity.
Comparisons between human and plant sexuality are recurring, with Grete being asked during an examination about a plant that possesses one female reproductive apparatus to roughly 20 male ones. A male professor asks her about views on such “promiscuous” activity, to which she promptly replies: “I’m not a plant”. The man retorts, inappropriately: “no, but you are far more attractive”. Some men think that female sexual desire is an aberration, and that the privilege of multiple partners should be restricted to males specimens. Back to the 1970s, Gundula’s approach to sex is very pragmatic: she offers to shag a shellshocked Hannes, She believes that he’s a virgin, That’s natural selection at play.
Other interesting moments include Hannes repeatedly trying to startle the geranium on his window ledge, obviously to no avail. The poor plant doesn’t budge. He is undoubtedly spurred by the knowledge that plants can think and make decisions. We learn that the Mimosa Pudica is deemed an “intelligent plant” because it reacts to our reactions in a speed and timeframe that are compatible with ours. It is extremely arrogant of humans to claim that these marvellous living beings are not intelligent simply because their timing is very different. Being slow doesn’t mean being stupid or unable to make decisions.
In the most recent segment, Tony feels disconnected from his hosts: not only because of the Covid pandemic, but also because he doesn’t speak a word of the language of Goethe. So he seeks affection elsewhere: he develops a physical connection with the tree,. He attaches large sensors to the large plant and then attempts to read the results. It looks charming, almost puerile. An exquisite blend of fantasy and science fiction.
The plots of Silent Friend spread in various directions, much like the branches of the ever-present Gingko tree. At times, it lapses into intellectualism, or niche literature and botanical knowledge. The journey is still intriguing and enjoyable, much like navigating a network of unknown countryside roads at dawn. As inconclusive as the resolution might be, this is still a worthy cinematic ride. The proceedings are wrapped by an sombre and enchanting song by Einstürzende Neubauten, the German industrial band or Blixa Bargeld. Just don’t expect orgasmic beats. In many ways, Silent Friend is a hypnotic and bathetic experience. A movie for meditative viewers, tree-huggers and human lovers.
Silent Friend premiered in the Official Competition of the 82nd Venice International Film Festival, where this piece was originally written. Also showing at the 69th BFI London Film Festival.
