As of: January 25, 2024, 10:59 a.m
By: Tobias Gmach
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Side by side on stage in the Starnberg seaside resort: In 2022, Sandra Hülser was awarded the Hannelore Elsner Prize at Matthias Helwig's Five Lakes Film Festival.
© JÖRG REUTHER
Festival director Matthias Helwig spoke to Starnberger Merkur about the Hannelore Elsner Prize winner and Oscar nominee Sandra Hülser.
The actress is very happy about her career advancement.
Starnberg - After the Hannelore Elsner Prize at the Five Lakes Film Festival (FSFF) 2022, an Oscar for Sandra Hülser would be the next logical step.
Festival director Matthias Helwig smiles at this somewhat bold claim.
But he also says: “This is a confirmation of our work.” Actress Hülser was nominated for the most famous film award for her leading role in the legal drama “Anatomy of a Case”.
Not in any category – but as best actress.
And Helwig and his film festival team are very happy about it.
“We are already thinking: how lucky we were that she came to us in Starnberg,” says the operator of the widescreen cinemas in Starnberg, Gauting and Seefeld.
He wasn't surprised by the news from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences in Los Angeles.
“For people from the film industry, the nomination had actually been clear for a long time,” says Helwig.
Hülser was awarded the European Film Prize in December for the role in question.
“Anatomy of a Case” can currently be seen in all three widescreen cinemas at selected times - in Gauting often in the original with subtitles.
Hülser plays a writer who is suspected of murdering her husband.
The film takes first place in Helwig's personal list of recommendations for cinemagoers, which he published on the widescreen homepage.
“I always go into the halls.
I often stay seated during 'Anatomy of a Case,'” he says.
From his point of view, Hülser's game is particularly impressive because of its depth.
She embodies two or three levels of her characters in one situation.
For example, in a certain scene you don't know: "Is she flirting now?"
Or is she just calculating?” This offers tension for the viewer.
Helwig also appreciates the 45-year-old actress' range of roles, pointing to the stressed-out management consultant in "Toni Erdmann" or the wife of Auschwitz camp commandant Rudolf Höss in "The Zone of Interest".
Helwig: “She plays the woman next door, that’s what makes her art.”
Helwig perceived Hülser as a “completely normal woman”.
The cinema operator also saw Hülser as a “normal woman” at the FSFF in Starnberg in the summer of 2022.
Since then she has stood in the same row as Barbara Auer, Nina Hoss and Birgit Minichmayr, who won the Hannelore Elsner Prize before her.
In 2023 the title went to Paula Beer.
After the award ceremony at the Starnberg lido, Helwig and Hülser went to the Italian restaurant Al Gallo Nero together.
“It was like eating spaghetti at home.
She was totally natural and not at all aloof,” says the Gilchinger.
The fact that greats like Wim Wenders come to Starnberg in 2014 or Iris Berben in 2023 also requires a bit of luck – and contacts.
In Hülser's case, it came about through the director Anika Pinzke.
Hülser had a supporting role in their film “Everyone Talks About the Weather”.
Of course, it is now very exciting to follow the further path of the actress, who was born in Suhl, Thuringia, says Helwig.
“Now there are completely different requests.” However, Helwig doesn’t believe that Hülser will win the Oscar against Emma Stone, Carey Mulligan and Co.
He thinks the Academy will choose Lily Gladstone (“Killers of the Flower Moon”).
The American was the first woman with indigenous roots to be awarded Best Actress at the Golden Globes in January.
Helwig suspects that the Oscars makers also want to make this statement.
Either way: several Hülser films will be shown in widescreen cinemas until the Oscars on March 11th.
In parallel to the cinema operation, Helwig and Co. are now preparing for the 2024 film festival, which is expected to take place from August 20th to 28th.
He already has one or two highlights in mind, but they aren't ready to be decided yet.