Maybe I'm being a bit dense, but I watched Sound Of Falling while wondering what the title actually meant. Just for a while. Then I started to consider that it might mean multiple things. There's a literal moment that it refers to, someone landing on the ground floor of a barn, but it could also refer to falling through time, as the film takes viewers between the lives of some girls and women who are often separated from one another by a timespan of three or four decades. There are "idols" that have fallen from their elevated position, some individuals falling for the charms of others, and family units falling apart.
Directed by Mascha Schilinski, who also co-wrote the film with Louise Peter, this is a look at different families living in the same farmhouse throughout the past century. The family living there in the 1910s have a great deal of death and hardship overshadowing their daily lives. The family living there in the 1940s live in the shadow of events from the past thirty years. In the 1980s, young Angelika (Lena Urzendowsky) feels like a nexus between the past and the future. Last, but not least, is Lenka (Laeni Geiseler), a young girl who befriends, and starts trying to emulate, Kaya (Ninel Geiger).
While very stylistically formal, and absolutely deliberate in every point being made, Sound Of Falling manages, thanks to the shifting between time periods and the shot choices, to feel like a collaborative visual poem for many scenes, as opposed to a standard narrative feature. The German title apparently translates to "Looking Into The Sun", which I think is a lesser title, but certainly ties in with the idea of forcibly looking at something that people often ignore, despite feeling it as a constant presence in life. There's a lot going on here, yet Schilinski and Peter make it all more digestible and thought-provoking by guiding us viewers gracefully in between the assembled characters and onscreen years as if we were ghosts trying to check in on family members and loved ones. It's quite a unique experience, initially disorientating, but gradually more manageable as one or two characters become rocks to cling to while the waves of time keep trying to pull us down into dark undercurrents and eddies.
While nobody gives a poor performance, Urzendowsky is the absolute highlight of the film. A cheeky and warm presence looking horribly likely to be damaged by others who cannot give her the space for her journey through typical teen adventures, she shines brightest and subsequently has the darkest shadows around her. Claudia Geisler-Bading is also fantastic in this strand, playing her mother, and both Konstantin Lindhorst and Florian Geißelmann play, respectively, a man and a boy who look poised to pin down the butterfly in their midst. Geiseler and Geiger are also very good, and Luise Heyer does very well in the role of Christa, the mother of Geiseler's character. There are a number of other important individuals (such as Fritz, played by two different actors to show him at two different ages, young and inquisitive Erika, a maid named Trudi, and a sombre and cold mother named Emma), all playing their part in this chrono-tapestry, but the film peaks with the scenes showing the life of Angelika and her mother.
Unaware of how the subject matter would be presented, and knowing that the runtime was a hefty 155 minutes, I admit to being a bit daunted as I went into this one. I'm glad I decided to press play. Not only was it a great surprise, it's absolutely in contention to be one of the best films of 2025. I recommend it to all other film fans, and I'm surprised that I hadn't heard much more about it before now. It's hard to imagine Schilinski equalling or bettering this with her next feature, but I'll absolutely be ready to give her my time and attention nonetheless.
9/10
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