Soderbergh Hopes Europeans Embrace ‘Good German’

BERLIN (February 9, 2007) — Steven Soderbergh is hoping his black-and-white film-noir homage, “The Good German,” will win over Europeans, after getting a cool response from U.S. critics.

The movie, screened Friday as one of 22 in the race for the Berlin Film Festival’s top Golden Bear award, follows the story of an American journalist — played by George Clooney — lured into a murder mystery in postwar Berlin.

Soderbergh used 1940s lenses and a single camera, attempting to replicate both the limitations and technical and artistic triumphs of the era.

“It was just one of the best experiences I’ve had making a movie — it was so close to what I had imagined,” the Oscar-winning director told reporters after the screening.

Soderbergh said the movie had a very bad reception in the U.S.

“The film is a strange hybrid — its approach to the narrative in terms of the momentum is very American; its approach to its characters and its approach to morality is much more European,” he said.

“We’ll see if we fall between two stools,” he said. “But I feel like we’re going to get a more sympathetic reading than we did in the States.”

Soderbergh, 44, said he went into filming “The Good German” with a “manifesto,” in which he tried to describe his aims to the actors — among them Clooney’s co-star, Cate Blanchett, who joined Soderbergh at the film’s presentation in Berlin.

“It was just a reminder that the style of performance 60 years ago in Hollywood was very different from the way actors are encouraged to act today,” he said. “It’s a very externalized, outward style of performance and it can be very weird to do.”

The winner of the Golden Bear award will be chosen Feb. 17.

Soderbergh won an Oscar in 2001 for “Traffic.”

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