The Sound of Fast Relief

After a flirtatious encounter, a young man finds it difficult to organise the hoped-for reunion with the object of his desire. Calls remain unanswered and he is left with only a drink, his bed and images of soldiers in combat to fill his inner void. Meanwhile, the boundaries between imagination, reality and dream dissolve, and a cinematic chess game ensues in which queer identity is pitted against patriarchal violence. One of Wieland Speck’s first works enshrines much of what would go on to inform his decades-long work as Panorama curator: to understand courage and imagination as a political opportunity to develop a space for alternatives in a heterosexualised world. Zazie de Paris as a hostess and Kurt Hübner in the role of an officer provide the film with its sharp sense of irony. (Berlinale)