Review of Import/Export (2007) by Stuart K — 23 Apr 2012

From Austrian director Ulrich Seidl, and nominated for the Palme D'Or at Cannes in 2007, this is a dark, unsettling drama that has the tone and structure of a horror film, but it shows two parallel stories of people unsatisfied in their lives and how moving on can have polarising consequences.

It's dark, quite graphic both in terms of sex and violence, but it's very compelling. It begins in Eastern Ukraine, in a slum hung over from the Soviet era, where nurse Olga (Ekateryna Rak) is unsatisfied in her life, and she doesn't get paid enough as a nurse, being diddled out of pay.

So, she turns to internet porn, which is horrible. So, she packs up, and moves out to Vienna, where she gets a job as a cleaner in a hospital, where she falls for senile, geriatric patient Erich Schlager (Erich Finches).

Meanwhile in Vienna, hot-headed Pauli trains to be a security guard, but is sacked when he's mugged by Turkish drunkards, penniless, and owing money to his stepfather Michael (Michael Thomas), but they get a job in delivering old videogame machines to the Ukraine, where Pauli's attempt at hiring a prostitute end up with him on his own in the snowy wilderness.

It's a dark drama, but very compelling and painting a picture of a world in the Ukraine which is seldom seen on film, but it's showing a real plight many people face when they think moving to another country can hide the fact that they made a hash of things in their homeland.

It's almost like a Ken Loach film, only more bleaker, and it's still uncertain by the end if things get better or worse.