Smile, you're dead

>> Make-believe murderers prowl a changing metropolis in killer.berlin.doc

by RUPERT BOTTENBERG

If Blair Witch Project was a fiction film masquerading as a documentary,

Tina Ellerkamp and Joerg Heitmann's killer.berlin.doc is the opposite. Based on a childhood game where players stage fake murders in a controlled environment, the film brings the idea into the day-to-day real world of adults, to show the evolution of Berlin from its free-for-all heyday after the Wall went down the more staid, business-oriented metropolis it is now. Ten players served as both "killers" and "victims," keeping records of their experiences and thoughts while planning mayhem through "car bombs" (tin cans tied to a rear bumper), "poisoning" (a rubber spider hidden in a shoe) and even a forced ritual suicide over a stuffed bunny.

Mirror: Is the killer game a common thing?

Joerg Heitmann: No. People played it in Amsterdam in the '80s, and we used it for a casual event in the early '90s.

Tina Ellerkamp: We had a group of artists sticking together, a club and an exhibition space. It was all concerned with reality and fiction, and that's where we played the killer game for the first time. It was more for fun and people didn't take it seriously enough, so it didn't really work. When we started working on the film, in the mid- to late-'90s, people were spreading out and going their own way--we had to find our professions and earn money, rents went up. We couldn't experiment anymore. We thought this film would show the changes, so there is a little bit of melancholy.

JH: We didn't want to do just an interview film. We looked for a structure for the narrative level. With the game, we could show the places where the people live, the bars, the whole environment.

M: How did you choose your participants?

JH: They're all more or less friends of ours. It was very difficult to find them because, by the rules of the game, they're not allowed to know each other.

TE: Also, they all work in creative fields--artists, musicians, writers, architectural photographers, cartoonists.

M: It was interesting to see the different players' reactions to the process of pursuit and death, which went from guilt to paranoia to impatience to flat-out bloodlust.

TE: We tried to find different kinds of personalities so that we'd see a wide range of reactions to the game, but we weren't sure in advance--you never know. This was an experiment where we'd take the material out of the game and make a film out of that. We wanted it to be a story that develops by itself.

Busted in real time

M: Did you worry about the crossover with reality, like hassles with the police?

JH: We filmed a lot with hidden cameras, and that was very interesting, especially in East Berlin--we're West Berliners. Some people got very angry at us. I was lying behind a bush, filming my friends in secret, and passersby saw me there with the camera and became very, very aggressive. "What are you doing here? We've had this all the time! Go away!" I tried to explain it was a game, but they said, "Bullshit! Come with us to the police!"

M: This brings up the privacy issue...

TE: We made sure they all knew that they would be filmed without them being aware. Also, it was forbidden for players to break into their victims' flats. This was so that everybody had a space to get back to and calm down if needed. For instance, one player felt constantly observed, even if she wasn't, and couldn't handle it. We called each of them every day, and with her we had lots of hour-long discussions, explaining it was just a game.

M: Do you think the film was successful in presenting a snapshot of changing Berlin?

TE: Yes and no. We knew in advance that we couldn't give the whole picture--it was very subjective, a certain scene. We'd hoped that they would say a little more about the city, but then the game took over everything. That's why the dividing interviews were so important, even if they lie like stones in the game structure.

JH: We thought the killers should describe more the city, their daily situations. That's why we played this game--to set yourself into a fictional situation, where everything could have another meaning. I give you a flyer, but it could be a poisoned flyer. So you're looking at your daily reality with a totally different point of view. :

At the Goethe-Institut on Thursday, April 20, 8pm and Friday, April 21, 6:30pm. English and German with subtitles. Heitmann and Ellerkamp will be present for both screenings.