Lovely Rita is not lovely at all. She is a sulky, deceitful, calculating teenager bent on seducing the local bus driver. She is very much an outsider at school and is the source of many arguments at home.
In the title role Barbara Osika gives a good rendition of a frustrated and unbalanced youngster, despite the fact that the script is both rather dull and uninteresting.
A couple of sex scenes are suggested rather than portrayed in any detail. The faces of the participants are immobile and unseen by the camera. The back of the young girl's head is seen blocking out the face of the bus driver. With very little movement the rest is left to the imagination of the viewer. The scene is short. One wonders if the censor has been at work here.
The director seems to have an obsession with the backs of heads, but sometimes it can be quite effective. The bus driver is filmed from behind as he sits at the wheel ( just as the passengers see him) while Rita exchanges fleeting glances with him in the mirror above his head.
It's amazing how the lid of a pedestal toilet seat can start an argument which grows from day to day to an unexpectedly very tense situation.
The final climax comes quite suddenly and adds a nice bit of drama sadly lacking in the earlier part of the film.
Director: Jessica Hausner.
Cast: Harald Urban, Felix Eisier, Agnes Napieralska.
Austria, 2001.
Language: German.
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| Lovely Rita. 2001. |
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