Rimini

What do winters in summer holiday paradises look like? Misty, mysterious and melancholic. Or at least, if Ulrich Seidl is to believed in Rimini, his grotesque tale named after an Italian seaside resort. The Austrian director embellishes this dreary setting with grim characters who cannot afford a beach holiday in high season, in order to turn it into a microcosm in which he can explore the less beautiful sides of mankind. He does this with an ageing lead character: Richie Bravo, a jaded pod star who washed up on shore in Rimini to entertain tourists in dingy hotel bars. He is the epitome of past glory, and Seidl willingly follows this creep to the bottom when his 18-year-old daughter suddenly comes asking for her child support money. No one knows how to turn sex, tourism and amorality into such poignant films as Ulrich Seidl.

"A seasoned portrayer of abjection, but invariably with a comic twist and arguably a dash of cruelty, Seidl is in characteristic mode in Rimini. (...) It is very much a portrait film, centered on one larger than life character, a clapped-out cabaret crooner." - Screen Daily