Tour de Force

At first, their friends make fun of Hannes and Kiki when they opt for Belgium – the country only famous for chocolate and Jean-Claude van Damme – when it’s their turn to choose the destination for the annual cycling trip. But when Hannes discloses the real motive behind the trip, shock follows. He is terminally ill and has decided to die in Belgium.

This is the start of the new work by director and writer Christian Zübert, whose last film, the emotional "Three Quarter Moon", was very successful. "Tour the Force", a road film, is light in tone, but does not shy away from its very serious themes. The director shows, through the eyes of the friends participating in the tour, how different people’s attitudes are towards the conscious choice to die, towards death and life in general. The ensemble of actors works very well together, both in big dialogue scenes and in smaller scenes of quiet reflection. Florian David Fitz plays the role of Hannes in a deep and vulnerable manner; Julia Koschitz is very compelling in her role as Kiki, portraying very convincingly her helpless grief and fear of the future without her husband. The other actors (Jürgen Vogel, Miriam Stein, Hannelore Elsner and others) play their roles with feeling, yet in a realistic manner. Dramaturgically speaking, the most successful scenes by Zübert are the emotional ones where the director has chosen to forgo music and long dialogue in the most difficult scenes and emphasise the performances by the actors.

"Tour the Force" is an honest film about choosing to say goodbye to one’s life, as well as a hymn to friendship and finding beauty in everyday life.

Germany 2014