A different way of telling a story

One of the best movies of the year! Incredible from the beginning to the end.

Mostly, the movie is committed to the value of a good time.

I think this is a new genre that they're all sort of working their way through it and haven't got all the kinks worked out yet but it's a genre that works for me.

I believe that a romance film is as good as the couple and I surely remember this pair of outcasts. This kind of films, though, get seriously good when the subtle nuances of romance are told without saying, when the relationship can be further analyzed as to why it happened in the first place or what made it develop this or that particular way. I´m not gonna give any spoiler but this one can be discussed for a while. Then we get the awesome soundtrack to seal the deal.

The story - Its slightly complicated. Its about two people. The male protagonist (names I cant pronounce) who was running away from life due to a certain nothingness in his life. He faces a girl who is running away, albeit from family and traditions of a Turkish family settled in Hamburg. She bumps into him and asks him to help her. Help, for marrying her so that she could come out of her boundations and life life, the way she wants to and discover things.While the guy is forced into this union, the association changes their lives in different ways. They agreed that they are only taking help of each other to satisfy the girls parents. It turns out that the girl goes on her reckless way discovering what she wants in life, and the guy who had no interest in anything falls in love with this girl.A turn of events bring them close emotionally but take them apart at the same time. The movie is all about the tryst in their fortunes and how the characters integrate their lives with their hopes of living it a certain way.For the complexity this movie tries to portray, yet handling the plot very well, I give it a 7 on 10.

One of my favorite movies of recent years. Amazingly moving, bleak, sexy, funny, punky. Great acting, wonderful, simple photography, cool editing choices, and terrific music. An alcoholic, self-destructive Turk living in Germany agrees to marry young, borderline crazy, free spirited Turkish girl looking to get away from her grasping, tradition bound family. This simple plot leads to a relationship of amazing complexity, and a love story of joy, humor, and heartbreak. That's partly because filmmaker Akin approaches familiar situations with such a unique, playful and fresh eye, and partly because, along with his two lead actors he has created two unforgettable characters - rich in contradictions and confusion, like all of us. Nothing in their obvious personal experience is anything like mine. I've never been an immigrant, an alcoholic, or lost and self-destructive. Yet, with amazing ease I felt let into this world, and found the human connections underneath, the things we all share. Suddenly the differences in the human experience seemed much less important than the similarities. And, to me, this is the real genius Akin has shown in his last few films. By being so specific and real about a world, he, paradoxically makes it universal and accessible. My favorite film, by one of our very best working filmmakers.

The title actually better translated as "Against the wall" and, seems to me, expresses feelings of the director Faith Akin regarding fate of his Turkish compatriots transplanted from Turkey to Germany, very much dissimilar countries divided by culture, traditions and way of life. Cahit (Birol Unel) deeply assimilated Turk in German society, who lost someone dear to him and on the self-destruction mission. Sibel (Sibel Kekilli) is a young Turkish girl, feeling trapped in the stifling confines of her traditional family, not being able to escape, trying to commit series of unsuccessful suicides. I hope you are getting the picture, and this is not a pretty one! Both of them are driven by basic instincts to which they give themselves fully. Loveless sex, drugs, bar scenes – the works. They are both "walled in" by their individual worlds from which there is no escape. Cahit is unpleasant, nasty, egoistic, dirty and ugly personality. Sibel is passionate, self indulgent, immediate-gratification type. Both of them do not exhibit any trace of intellectual life what-so-ever. They as well could be a pig and a cow. Food, sex, drugs – not the drive to improve themselves, use what god's given, learn to see beauty in the nature, develop and use your mind instead of systematically destroying it.Oh well, you will say, but they are in special circumstances. Human condition, you will say. What can you do? They are trying and trying but somehow can never quite kill themselves. Perhaps because their level of wretchedness can never exceed their hope for another round of sex, drugs, or any other such bodily pleasure. They hurt other people, who feel responsible for them, abuse them. And what about human condition of the rest of us, who are trying to bring meaning to our lives? Do we have rights? Do we deserve respect, even if we do not hurt others, working, trying to make life pleasant to others, do not ask and expect handouts? But they are mentally ill, you will say. Don't we have responsibility to care for sick? Are we to abandon them? Dump our daughters and friends when they are sick? Perhaps we can save them? Hopefully, the "Head On" will chip off a piece of the wall that isolates main characters and permit better their social integration into German-Turkish-Human society.Faith Akin produced credible and potent work of art which will endure. The film can (and should be) viewed more than once and deserves the acclaim it had gotten. It is nuanced and rich in promises of more and better things to come from this director.