Der Bunker

2015 drama

Rating: 13/20

Plot: A math student in search of a quiet place to do some serious math work takes a room with a family of three in their bunker. Soon, he's given the task of educating their son, a future president of the United States.

This is the second movie I've seen with the actor Pit Bukowski. The first was Der Samurai, and I'm not going to look up his filmography, but I kind of hope he's only in movies that start with Der. This one intrigues early but loses steam while Nikias Chryssos, with his first feature film, gets a little too stylistically ambitious. I liked the look of the movie as Chryssos really takes advantage of a limited amount of space and frames the four characters well.

It's an unnervingly odd little picture, and at the center of it is the performance of Daniel Fripan who plays the kid. And that's really all I want to say about that.

I couldn't put all the pieces together thematically. Chryssos seems to have something to say about education, indoctrination, expectation, and parenting, but the ideas feel a little half cooked. in a way, it reminded me a little of Dogtooth, but I'm not sure if that's a good or bad thing here.