The Dreamed Ones

The romance between poets Paul Celan (1920—70) and Ingeborg Bachmann (19267—3) is told in minimalistic style by actors Anja Plaschg and Laurence Rupp reading the artists' letters to each other. Celan, a Holocaust survivor who lost his parents in a concentration camp, and Bachmann, the daughter of a Nazi party member, met post-World War II and embarked on an affair in Vienna. They went their separate ways but maintained a 20-year correspondence that is full of regret and longing, simple friendship, anger, frustration, and the desire to rekindle the romance. The camera lingers on the expressive faces of the actors as they read the letters and temporarily inhabit the writers' lives, then jumps point-of-view to look at what is happening outside that intimate recording space: the cafeteria, smoke breaks, playbacks, the studio, etc.