Film discussion: Toni Erdmann

Well, friends, we’re going to need that desire, because Tuesday’s movie discussion will be about Toni Erdmann, a German comedy that, among its other oddnesses, runs for two hours and 42 minutes. That’s right, the running time is 162 minutes.

And since the average comedy usually runs between 90 and 100 minutes, and the average drama around 120 minutes, that running time puts Toni Erdmann at the limit of most people’s butt-cheek compression capacity.

So we must ask ourselves if the movie is going to be worth it. And the resounding answer I get from both the critical community and the movie-going masses is yes, and big fat YES! Toni Erdmann is a story of a father who wants to spend more time with his (mildly estranged, business-obsessed) daughter, and indulges his taste for prankish behavior by putting on a weird wig and even weirder teeth to worm his way into her company.

Much of the appeal of the movie I have to take on faith, of course, since I haven’t seen it yet. But when a movie gets a metascore of 93 on MetaCritic, I’m intrigued, because I generally like movies that score well. And it doesn’t hurt that the film was nominated for a Best Foreign Language Film Oscar, although it didn’t win.

I’m also dying to see more of Peter Simonischek, the shambling giant who dons the wig and teeth to gain entry to his daughter’s work life. The guy’s got power in a quiet way.

So, bring your back pillows and your sitting pads and let’s see what Toni Erdmann is all about. I expect a bunch of laughs, and the word on the street is that the emotional payoff at the end is well worth it.

I hope to see you there, which will be in The Historic Theater at 7:00.

And you can also mark your calendars for two more Best Picture Oscar nominees in March. On March 7, we will be discussing Lion (a rare instance of a movie I’ve already seen. You’ll love it!). Then we will be viewing Fences on March 21, a film that brought home two major Oscars and was nominated for several others.