"Baker´s bread"
Director: |
Erwin Keusch |
Screenplay: |
Erwin Keusch, Karl Saurer |
Director of photography: |
Dietrich Lohmann |
Editor: |
Lilo Krüger |
Cast: |
Bernd Tauber, Günter Lamprecht, Maria Lucca, Sylvia Reize, Anita Lochner, Manfred Seipold |
”What ‚Moby Dick‘ did for whaling, this film does for baking bread.” (Nigel Andrews, ”Financial Times”, 1979) ”Das Brot des Bäckers”, the first feature film of the Swiss director Erwin Keusch, who lives in Munich, was the major discovery at the 10th International Film Festival in Hof, West Germany, 1976. Wolfram Schütte wrote in the ”Frankfurter Rundschau” (6 November 1976), ”It was almost like the premiere of Sinkel’s ‚Lina Brake‘ at the International Forum of Young Film in Berlin one year ago. The young audience was captivated, laughing and applauding at scenes in the film.” The critics and audiences were equally enthusiastic about this resilient, relaxed début, which proved convincingly that social issues can be dealt with in a film without sacrificing entertainment values.
A brief synopsis: The main character, a shy and reserved young man, travels to the small Franconian town of Hersbruck to learn the baker’s trade. After serving his apprenticeship, having a couple of romantic affairs and visiting the big city, he decides to stay in the small town and help the baker’s family he had been staying with deal with their professional and personal problems.
Hans C. Blumenberg dealt with the film extensively in the weekly ”Die Zeit” (4 March 1977): ”As an affectionate and finely detailed portrait of life in a small town and its youth, the film often reminds one of Peter Bogdanovich’s ”The Last Picture Show”, and in its epic stillness of the films of Wim Wenders, also because of the music of the group Improved Sound Limited, which was also heard in Wenders’s ‚Kings Of The Road‘.” |