Interview: Volker Einrauch

When adults who have children have other adult friends who also have children, those children will inevitably be thrown together on a regular basis. If you’re one of those children and you’re lucky, then you might get along with this other child. Or, if you’re Robert, in director, Volker Einrauch’s Der Andere Junge (The Other Boy), you’re lucky if you make it through an entire evening without your forced friend, Paul, beating you repeatedly.  Your parents barely know you and rarely listen to what you have to say so you can’t go to them with your troubles. You try reasoning with Paul but his antics only become worse when he smells your weakness. You are alone and no one is coming to your rescue. The results can be very isolating.  Before long, you feel cornered and you do what it takes without thinking about what will follow.

The Other Boy is Einrauch’s first feature film and it finds itself amongst a handful of others vying for the honour of “Best First Feature” at this year’s Montreal World Film Festival. It also marks another first for Einrauch, the first film in a series called “Local Player”. The series will focus on stylistic approach and monetary investment. Their focus will be ensuring neither goes overboard.  The rational behind the approach is that modest budgets and simple, yet clean style allow the viewer a deeper insight into the depths of the script and a more intimate interaction with the actors’ performances. Another component that contributes to the philosophy is an emphasis on location shooting. There are no constructed sets to be found in The Other Boy, only genuinely lived-in environments. Here, the viewer is given a better chance at understanding the true nature of the characters’ surroundings.

Nature finds itself at the center of The Other Boy, or is it nurture?  I can never make up my mind on the theory and sitting down with Einrauch certainly didn’t help me come to any conclusions. The German director was kind enough to sit with me despite his limited English and in turn, I have been kind enough to smooth out the rough edges of his speech. What he would not do was give away too much of what he saw in the film. It’s none too surprising really. Given his efforts to ground the film as much as possible in reality for the benefit of the viewer, it only stands to reason that he would refuse to take away from our experience by spelling everything out after the fact.

Joseph Bélanger: Congratulations, first of all, on such a successful screening. The audience seemed to be truly affected by the film. It must have made for a very satisfying world premiere. How does it feel to have the film be finally seen?
Volker Einrauch: Great, absolutely great.  I’m proud to be in the international competition.

JB: How has the reaction been?
VE: Well, good, but you only really hear the good reactions.  The bad reactions, you don’t hear. It seems to be impressive for people.

JB: Before the screening you spoke about The Other Boy being the first film in your “Local Player” series.  It’s a very interesting approach to filmmaking.  Could you describe it in your own words?
VE: The title is a little bit ironic reaction to globalization and the global market. The idea behind “Local Player” is to reduce, to use small teams, to use less equipment, to be flexible during the production and to concentrate on the simple, strong story and the presence of the actors.  You have to find subjects that lie beneath our own lives. We shot in Hamburg. Everything is original; all the places are original.

JB: Shooting in the suburbs of Hamburg allowed you to show different sides to suburban life.  What were you looking to expose?
VE: There are different kinds of suburbs. There are poor suburbs. There are skyscrapers and big complexes in the middle of nowhere. Maybe it is the same in other suburbs but Hamburg has suburbs where there is nothing but houses. There are no shops or other cultural things. As we shot the movie, we got a little impression of the atmosphere.

JB: Did you have any difficulty shooting in these locations?
VE: Neighbours would watch us during filming. One day, a male neighbour wanted to back out of his driveway while we were shooting. We begged him to wait until we got our shot but he didn’t. Then later, his wife came out to use the lawnmower and it was very noisy. It was clear she was doing it to disturb us. That’s a little bit of the atmosphere in these neighbourhoods.  That’s part of the reality there.

JB: You insist that the “Local Player” films have a modest stylistic approach but The Other Boy still looks very good.  How do you balance between modest and cheap?
VE: Nowadays, film stock is very advanced. You can shoot with very little light so we can reduce our equipment greatly. My cameraman had done mostly documentaries before so he is very used to these conditions. He always said less light was better. There is also the organization of the images but really the cameraman is most important. Also, I love working directly. Waiting while sets go up and down makes it difficult to keep the same tension.

JB: I wanted to talk a little bit about the story. The parents in the film can be very cold towards their son.  On many levels, it seems that both boys’ personalities and decisions are directly related to the way they are treated by their parents – be that firm or loose.  Do you feel that the boys should be held accountable for the actions they take in the film?
VE: Actually, I don’t really want to answer that.  I would rather let people see the movie and make their own conclusions about the boys and the parents and who is to blame for what. The message of the movie is for them to decide.

JB: I can’t argue with that.  It’s only fair.

I guess you’ll just have to see the movie to know more.