Heart of Stone (2014)
Penniless Peter Munk toils day after day as a charcoal burner in the Black Forest. In order to finally achieve the wealth he longs for and thus get closer to his previously unattainable crush Lisbeth, he turns to two mysterious forest spirits with his wishes. While the cranky little glass man can't really help him, the sinister Dutchman-Michel promises him an end to his financial worries. However, he demands Peter's heart in return and puts a cold stone in his chest instead. Although he can now afford everything and finally take Lisbeth as his wife, Peter no longer has any compassion, which soon has devastating consequences not only for himself but also for his fellow human beings.
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Too much of everything
Tells a fascinating and unsettling true story, and does so well, without pretending to have all the answers.
This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.
Excellent and certainly provocative... If nothing else, the film is a real conversation starter.
"Das kalte Herz" is another fairytale adaptation (for Christmas time 2014) for television from Germany. These have been quite popular in recent years. And as many of them appeared, the great thing is that there are really not that many who sucked. This one is good too. It's not a tale by the Brothers Grimm this time, but by Wilhelm Hauff and possibly a bit darker than the Grimm tales. Also this film runs for almost 90 minutes and thus considerably longer than most of these fairytale films. The movie's director is Marc-Andreas Borchert, an Academy Award nominee in the short film category 15 years ago.It's about a poor boy, who gets rich, but turns into a bad person. He starts gambling, gets more and more greedy and even starts beating his girl, even kills her in the end. In Grimm fairy tales no good characters get killed. Well, admittedly the girl is not actually dead in the end. And there is a great deal of morale included as well of course. And a happy end as always.On a side-note, I liked the very early reference between the main character's profession ("burning coals") and the film's title. Nice opposite of temperature. Don't be fooled by the short description on the film's title page here. This is neither a short film nor animated. The lead actor and the girl who plays his wife are not too known, but the supporting cast includes some familiar faces: Prückner, Thiele and Gruber already appeared in "Das Leben der Anderen", "Die unendliche Geschichte", "The Reader", "Downfall" and many more. They bring the necessary expertise to their respective roles. Good film. Recommended.