18/02/2024 - BERLINALE 2024: Keren Cytter's formally experimental and oddly engaging film could be described as a piece of kitchen-sink surrealism or a Beckett drama for the digital age

Elijah Lajmer, Edward Baker and Laura Hajek in The Wrong Movie

For a film made for $25,000, the title The Wrong Movie might initially seem like an alibi. But it is actually a fitting description for this formally experimental and oddly gratifying work by Tel Aviv-born, New York City-based writer, director and editor Keren Cytter, which has just world-premiered in the Berlinale's Forum section. Consisting of a series of vignettes with an ever-changing tone, it can make the viewer feel, from scene to scene, as if they had indeed walked into the wrong movie.

Fully set in a series of plain apartments, it can also be described as a piece of kitchen-sink surrealism. It opens with a close-up shot of a man's bottom in plain, white underwear as he makes coffee. But this is not a sexual thing; DoP Alex Huggins trains his lens on body parts throughout, at times following a character's gaze and at others just directing the viewer's attention.

The man at the beginning is Alex (Jordan Raofpur), who sits down to make an unboxing video for a drone. But he quickly switches to a confession about his addiction and his father's death five years ago, and how supportive his girlfriend Angel (Laura Hajek) was. Then she just appears in the flat. She's come to get her pressure cooker. The film suddenly shifts tone from whimsical to sentimental (Dan Bodan's creative, multi-genre score guides such changes), and we find out they have broken up.

Followed by Alex's drone, Angel takes the pressure cooker home and makes a food vlog, and when the drone arrives at the window, she brightens up, looking at it with pure love. Then she goes to her new boyfriend's place. Played by Elijah Lajmer, John is another addict and a wannabe actor. And the drone will keep reappearing.

The suicidal Nicole (Ashby Bland) has just cremated her father. Rob (multimedia artist John Verdil) is a cleaner who comes to her place and admits he used to be a sex addict, just before quoting the Bible. In the bathroom, Nicole appears to communicate with a neighbour through the toilet bowl, out of which butterflies emerge. Later, Nicole visits drug dealer Timor (Edward Baker), who lives with his mother (singer Devery Doleman), who says he is a good boy but not as good as his brother Alex. In the meantime, after smoking heroin, Nicole and Timor consider falling in love but decide against it.

Apart from Alex, they all seem to be neighbours (although Alex’s drone is always around), or at least Nicole and Angel live in the same building. But more interesting than getting these details is Cytter's cryptic and playful formal approach: the cast often seems to be just reciting the lines like in a reading rehearsal, or they talk about the audience. These whiffs of Brecht are complemented by framing that is, at times, slightly reminiscent of Woody Allen's way of breaking the fourth wall, but more in the way of atmosphere than the narrative.

Like a Beckett drama for the digital age, The Wrong Movie deals with existential questions, such as the feeling of loss and loneliness in a constantly connected world. But it is far from trivial or redundant – there is much more to be found between the lines of this apparently simple, but in fact quite complex, work. The movie may feel wrong, but most of the time it actually seems to get things right.

The Wrong Movie is a co-production between the USA's A.P.E art projects era and Belgium's LLS Paleis art space.