This triptych tale of a family in turmoil is equal parts incredibly moving and scabrously funny, Matthias Glasner’s award-winning drama may be called Dying, but it’s really a celebration of the messiness of life.
Matthias Glasner’s epic is a black comedy of Franzenesque family dysfunction; maybe not profound exactly but terrifically watchable and entertaining.
Screened as part of 2024
Dying 2024
Sterben
“Unabashedly sporting the most inauspicious of titles, a three-hour running time and a logline that features terminally ill elders and self-destructive descendants, German feature Dying looks like a hard sell on paper. And yet writer-director Matthias Glasner’s crisscrossing family drama manages to be exceedingly funny, often in some of its darkest moments, as well as expectedly sad. Anchored by a nuanced, detailed performance by Lars Eidinger as Tom, an orchestra conductor juggling all manner of personal and professional commitments, and pitch-perfect turns by Corinna Harfouch, Lilith Stangenberg and Ronald Zehrfeld as the rest of his combustible nuclear family, this richly rewards the time investment it requires.” — Leslie Felperin, Hollywood Reporter
“As much about the mess of life as about life’s end, Dying – which tells the stories of three members of the same family in overlapping timescales – is a surprising, shape-shifting modern melodrama held aloft by a string of fine performances. It is given added emotional ballast by a specially composed orchestral piece, whose troubled rehearsal and performance history becomes the story’s existential soul.” — Lee Marshall, Screen Daily