Mondtag - 1973
ABOUT THE FILM : Mondtag
Deutsche KinemathekLunar Day
Year: 1973
While his parents are arguing, a young boy escapes from the apartment and leaves, alone, to face the outside world.
Very quickly he appears to be freer, happier and smiles when others cry. From a merry-go-round in the centre of town he finds himself in the middle of a forest populated with strange animals and curious characters straight out of his imagination. After his journey, the child goes back home but finds himself confronted with a heavy closed door, that of the real world.
Nationality: German
Actors: Andreas Hensel, Dorothee Zippel
Length: 18' 30"
Genre: fiction
Sound: sound
Original elements: colour
Producer: Haro Senft
Composer: Richard Palmer
Original language: German
A BRIEF HISTORY : Mondtag
Born in Czechoslovakia in 1928, at a very young age Haro Senft was devoted to painting, his first passion. In 1954 he created his production company, Boheme Film that would become Haro Senft Filmproduktion two years later. At the end of the 1950’s with other film directors like Edgar Reitz and Alexander Kluge, Haro Senft set himself up as the founder of the New German Film Industry, a film industry without conventions and without commercial constraints.
When it was released, Mondtag was considered to be an important contribution to understanding a child’s mental health. The film starts and ends with reality, that of the outside world, but the whole story is played in the young character’s mind. By taking the forest as a symbol of the little boy’s subconscious and imagination, Haro Senft offers the viewer the chance to delve into a child’s unconscious mind with surprising results.
In the same way as he had already shown in previous films like Die Brücke and Auto Auto, Haro Senft wanted to highlight how things were going adrift in the modern world, and in Mondtag, its consequences on young children. Violence, verbal in the film and illustrated by a parental quarrel, encouraged the child to take refuge in his own universe.
Richard Palmer, singer and guitarist in Supertramp, wrote the soundtrack for this film.
