Berlinale 2024: Lena Dunham Goes on a Journey to Poland in ‘Treasure’
by Alex Billington
February 18, 2024
There’s yet one more fascinating set of dual movies in 2024 – two movies which can be remarkably comparable in so some ways although they’re totally unbiased, unrelated productions. The primary movie premiered on the 2024 Sundance Movie Pageant in January titled A Actual Ache, written, directed by, and starring Jesse Eisenberg, and it received the Screenwriting Award at that competition (this is my full overview). The second movie is premiering now on the 2024 Berlin Movie Pageant in February titled Treasure, directed by German filmmaker Julia von Heinz, and starring actors Stephen Fry & Lena Dunham as father & daughter. Each movies contain People touring to Poland, flying into Warsaw, from the place they embark upon a “heritage” highway journey tour round Poland to seek out an previous house the place somebody they know as soon as lived in a few years in the past earlier than fleeing Poland. Each additionally function annoying characters, jokes about vacationers visiting Poland, and journeys to a Jewish graveyard in addition to a Nazi focus camp. They’re each so comparable it is laborious to not discuss each, although this overview is meant to be about Treasure, I need to evaluate them as tales about comparable themes.
Treasure relies on a real story, primarily based on an precise journey a lady and her dad took, and their experiences touring to Poland simply after the Iron Curtain got here down. A Actual Ache, nevertheless, is just not primarily based on a real story however it is impressed by Jesse Eisenberg’s circle of relatives and his experiences. His movie is sort of the alternative – the making of his movie turned his actual model of going again to Poland, as the home they go to and movie at is the precise home his grandmother lived in years in the past. In Treasure, the story’s core is a couple of man who truly went to and survived Auschwitz, and whereas he does not need to dig up the previous, his daughter does and so she takes him to Poland to see the place his life was spent throughout that (harrowing) time. Each movies have a extra pensive, quiet, humble character attempting to grasp Poland’s previous, subsequent to a extra annoying, loud, brash character who appears each keen on and tired of Poland’s previous. It is a complicated dynamic – A Actual Ache handles it higher, particularly as a result of Kieran Culkin’s character is definitely endearing, whereas Stephen Fry’s character is simply plain annoying & grating, regardless of the try to make him a lovable previous Polish chap.
Whereas I am not Jewish and should not have a Holocaust connection just like the individuals in these movies, I do have Polish roots and I do really feel a connection to Poland. Nonetheless, my connection to those movies is proscribed as a result of I should not have a want to discover Poland on a heritage tour or to discover a connection to the Jewish Poland that existed pre-World Conflict II. It is a vital story to inform, in fact, and it’s an intriguing matter to contemplate relating to their grief and ache and connection to a horrible previous, nevertheless it’s one thing that I thought to have already been addressed within the almost 80 years since WWII ended and the camps had been liberated. Why are there two new movies about this very same story showing in 2024? Each had been in manufacturing earlier than the Palestine-Israel occasions in 2023. Eisenberg’s movie, between them, makes an attempt to deal with this heavier theme in a extra clever manner by connecting the pains of recent descendants of Jewish Poles, with the intense ache and unhappiness of their previous. There’s an unbelievable speech that Eisenberg’s character David provides in that movie at a dinner that delves proper into this precise matter, whereas there’s a by no means a coherent second of reflection like this in Treasure. It by no means correctly examines and contends with these compelling generational variations.
Maybe one of many key explanation why Eisenberg’s movie A Actual Ache stands out is that it’s way more private story, authentically informed because the filmmaker’s personal actual story along with his personal feelings and emotions and considerations expressed by means of the characters and the filmmaking decisions. Treasure, then again, is just not Julia von Heinz’s personal story, she is a director telling a narrative that comes from one other individual. And whereas she does her finest to competently carry this story to the display, capturing the feelings and emotions of her characters, the authenticity does not shine by means of, it feels way more performative and apparent than Eisenberg’s creation. That is most evident within the 4 lead characters (two from every movie), and the way totally different they’re to observe in every movie, regardless of so many similarities. The largest distinction is, in fact, Stephen Fry’s Edek, who’s an precise Jewish Pole that survived the Holocaust, making his return to Poland that rather more emotionally wrought. Nevertheless, Fry is a British actor, who needed to study Polish and placed on a heavy accent to carry out this position. Whereas his Polish is spectacular, the efficiency feels barely off, and never as healthful as obligatory.
As a lot as I need to evaluate these two movies for being so comparable, they do every have totally different commentary to supply viewers. Treasure is way more in regards to the ache of entering into the previous, and the way laborious it’s for one to do this; all of the whereas the subsequent era appears like the one manner they’ll totally perceive their household is to step into the previous. Does she come to grasp her father higher after this journey? The movie did not persuade me of this, however maybe in actual life she did. A Actual Ache is way more about how these trendy era 30-somethings really feel about that previous, and the way they might haven’t survived the Holocaust but additionally have their very own distinctive pains and struggles in the present day as nicely. My greatest grievance with each movies is how poorly they signify Polish individuals. In A Actual Ache, they solely ever work together with Polish individuals a couple of times, for barely a minute or two. In Treasure, lots of the Polish individuals they work together with come throughout as sketchy, sneaky, or oddly problematic individuals. Whereas it might have been a nuanced statement within the true story it is primarily based on, it comes throughout as condescending on this movie, as if no Poles post-WWII (aside from a foyer boy who helps translate and their taxi driver) are good individuals. Having visited Poland a number of instances, I can say that is simply not true.
Alex’s Berlinale 2024 Ranking: 6 out of 10
Observe Alex on Twitter – @firstshowing / Or Letterboxd – @firstshowing
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