Senior Citizen Kane: Fatherland

In a masterclass of control and precision, Paweł Pawlikowski explores the fragmented soul of postwar Germany through a father-daughter road trip dominated by personal ghosts.

Fatherland centres on the relationship between the Nobel Prize-winning writer Thomas Mann (Hanns Zischler, Munich, Kings of the Road) and his daughter Erika (Sandra Hüller, Anatomy of a Fall, Project Hail Mary) - actress, writer and rally driver. In the summer of 1949, at the height of the Cold War, father and daughter embark on a challenging and emotional road trip in a black Buick taking them across a Germany in ruins - from US dominated Frankfurt to Soviet controlled Weimar. Returning home after sixteen years of exile in the US, Thomas Mann has to face not only a divided fatherland, but also a deep fracture within his own family.

With Fatherland, Pawlikowski picks up where he left off with his award-winning Ida and Cold War, exploring – in his elliptic, distilled style - the themes of identity, family, love and guilt amid the turmoil and confusion of post-war Europe.

"An impossibly elegant, poised historical vignette whose brevity and control can hardly contain its characters’ personal and historical pain." - The Guardian's 5-star review of Fatherland.