Continuing our cinematic tour across Europe, this time we find ourselves in Slovakia. Martin Sulik directs last year's surprising sensation Peter Simonischek (protagonist of the international success Toni Erdmann which is currently being remade in the US) along with Jiri Menzel (Closely Watched Trains (1966)) in a sweet roadtrip about two men who are most unlikely to become friends.
Ali Ungar (Menzel) is a man who at the last years of his life is in search of the German Officer who killed his parents in WWII. He wants to find out where his parents were buried but his intention is also to kill the particular officer. The movie begins at the exact moment when he has found the officer's flat. When he rings the bell, Georg Graubner (Simonischek) answers the door: he is the officer's son and informs Ungar that his father has died.
The two men's first meeting is rather tense because of the awkardness of being in the same room with a person whose relatives have harmed one's family. Ungar seems certain that Georg is a fascist himself and leaving the apartment he also leaves a swastiga on Georg's letterbox. The latter then, attempts another meeting with Ungar and proposes to pay him as an interpreter in a roadtrip, in which they will both try to find what they are looking for: Ungar's parents whereabouts and Georg's father's past.
The two men's first meeting is rather tense because of the awkardness of being in the same room with a person whose relatives have harmed one's family. Ungar seems certain that Georg is a fascist himself and leaving the apartment he also leaves a swastiga on Georg's letterbox. The latter then, attempts another meeting with Ungar and proposes to pay him as an interpreter in a roadtrip, in which they will both try to find what they are looking for: Ungar's parents whereabouts and Georg's father's past.
It is always compelling watching characters who have nothing in common try to make a connection. Ungar is a man who has lost all joy for life; he is a lonely widower with an only daughter and seems quite detached from anything fun. On the other hand there is Georg, a man who never misses a chance to laugh or to flirt with women of all ages. Through Ungar's eyes he seems like an immature drunk, untouched by the tragedies caused by his father and uninterested in anything important or serious. Things are not as they look though.
Here we have two men, one who has missed his childhood and can never get it back and one who tries to look at the world through innocent childish eyes in order to forget the horrors that have occured in his family's past. It is not as if Georg doesn't accept what's happened; it is only that he chooses to move past it and live a full unaffected life. When Ungar's daughter confronts him about his stance, he says something that truly describes the whole movie: Who feels worse? The son of the victim or the son of the killer? And really, one might live a whole life in sadness and bitterness but the other will also feel betrayed, puzzled and full of unwanted guilt.
The Interpreter achieves to make these points effortlessly, just by following these characters around Slovakia as they meet people who have memories of the horrific events that took place so many years ago. The two men soon (but not easily) manage to become friends and understand one another. Even though Ungar's character arc does not evolve as much as Georg's, he shows signs of empathy towards his German acquaintance especially when he realises that the latter has silently been tremendously affected by his father's actions. It is because of this small lack of evolution in Ungar that the film ends up following Simonischek before it finishes. The cruelties of war are things that no one can really get over, no matter how much they wish they could; war does not only destroy families, but it perpetuates discrimination, racism and prejudice, it obstructs possible friendships and it scars people for life.
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