Director Christian Petzold’s drama from Germany, Afire, is a quiet yet brilliantly effective character piece where four young people come together in a small holiday house by the Baltic Sea. The days are hot and as the parched forests around them begin to ignite, so do their emotions of happiness, lust and love; but also jealousies, resentments and tensions.
On July 12, after the Eastern Region Special Projects Committee Global Cinema Series screening in New York, Petzold discussed the making of the film during a Q&A moderated by Director Michael Almereyda (Tesla).
Asked about symbolism in the film, Petzold clarified that the fire is not a symbol, “During our shooting there was forest fires around us. You have this pollution in the air. I saw these old movies about summer and youth and no parents no work. There’s this fantastic genre for me. I saw the burning forests in Portugal, Spain, Turkey, Greece and now in Canada, and you can see what we are doing with our world. These young people know that there are not so many summers left. This is not a symbol; this is the reality. When we were in Berlin 10 years ago, everybody thought we have 100 summers left. We have lakes. We have water, but now the lakes are dried out. The forests are dying or burning. The young people think ‘summer and summer stories and love stories are not left for us.’ This is something that is not symbolized by the movie. It is reality.”
Petzold’s other directorial works include the feature films Transit, Jerichow and Phoenix. In addition to winning the Berlin International Film Festival Grand Jury Prize for Afire, he also won the festival’s FIPRESCI Prize for his 2020 feature, Undine, and his 2003 feature, Panorama, and the Silver Berlin Bear Best Director award for his 2012 feature, Barbara.