A wonderful, inventive tribute to the great composer. "Brings Bach's music to life with a mysterious, magnificent blend of drama, documentary, and quasi-surrealist whimsy." — New Yorker
Screened as part of NZIFF 2008
The Silence Before Bach 2007
Die Stille vor Bach
"Spanish director Pere Portabella's new film brings Bach's music to life with a mysterious, magnificent blend of drama, documentary, and quasi-surrealist whimsy... Portabella tickles the senses with a series of skits: a truck driver who plays Bach on the harmonica; Bach himself (the harpsichordist/organist Christian Brembeck) teaching his son Christoph Friedrich music via the 'Well-Tempered Clavier'; a Bach impersonator hosting tourists in Leipzig; an orchestra of cellists playing a suite while speeding along in a sleek new subway car... From puckish humor and borderline kitsch, a great and serious notion emerges: the construction of modern Europe on the basis of classical music, which, as a result, endures tenaciously there." — Richard Brody, New Yorker.
"At once cerebral film essay and unsweetened ear candy... A high-toned experimental feature that eschews narrative and ponders the social history of music." — J. Hoberman, Village Voice