Pingpong

Colour, 35 mm
Germany, 2006, 89 min
Section: Forum of Independents

Synopsis

Paul, 16, turns up uninvited to visit his relatives. Having recently lost his father, Paul is searching for an ideal world, and he intrudes upon the seemingly ideal family. After rejecting him at first, his aunt Anna slowly brings him under her wing. Paul is attracted to her. Only too late does he realize that he has been drawn into her game, and is now at her mercy. Paul’s hurt feelings drive him to an act of desperation. With this graduation film, Matthias Luthardt and his young team have produced a highly professional work, an intimate psychological study of several characters in a situation which slowly turns out to be less innocent than it seemed at the start.

About the director

Matthias Luthardt (b. 1972, Leiden, Netherlands) first studied German, French and rhetoric in Tübingen, Paris and Hamburg and in 1998-2005 directing at the Konrad Wolf Film and TV Academy in Potsdam-Babelsberg. In 1999 he co-founded the film production company “risingstar”. After directing numerous award-winning documentaries and short films, Pingpong is his first feature. In 2006, this graduation film was invited to the Cannes Semaine de la Critique, where it won an award for best screenplay from the French Association of Authors and Composers (SACD), as well as the Young Critics’ Award. Pingpong was subsequently nominated by the European Film Academy as Debut of the Year.