Run Lola Run (Day 37)

 My Opinion: 6.5 || A fun, quick adrenaline-rush of a movie. There’s nothing brilliant about the folding-back-on-itself storyline, but the uninhibited energy and brazen strangeness is delightful. On the downside, though, it’s a little damning that the movie’s single most memorable quality is Franka Potente’s hair.

TITLE: Run Lola Run (Lola rennt)
DIRECTOR: Tom Tykwer
LANGUAGE: German | COUNTRY: Germany
YEAR: 1998
PROFILE: Action | 81 minutes | IMDb (7.8)

SYNOPSIS (Courtesy of IMDb): A young woman in Germany has twenty minutes to find and bring 100,000 Deutschmarks to her boyfriend before he robs a supermarket.

Strengths: It’s an action movie, but a defiantly strange and quirky one. Tykwer never lets up with the inventiveness, and the movie flies along, with enough playful touches to fill multiple movies.

Weaknesses: The plot is lighter than air, and the few attempts at seriousness don’t add up to much. And it’s hard to feel deeply invested in characters who are so willing to pull guns on innocent people. The movie is brisk and fun enough, though, that there’s not much time (or reason) to think hard about the characters or their situation.

Characters/Performances: Has there ever been a character who was more defined by her hair? Franka Potente’s very un-movie-star appearance is an important factor in movie’s appeal.

File Under: action, crime, time reversal, alternate realities, great hair