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Mr. Jones (2019)

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In 2017 Polish director Agnieszka Holland won the Silver Bear for SPOOR. Two years later she is back in Berlin to tell the story of a hero who is still fairly unknown outside of Wales. The eponymous MR. JONES is Gareth Jones, a welsh journalist born in 1905, who in 1933 managed to conduct an exclusive interview with Hitler. Although the Reichskanzler had only just been elected, Jones already suspected that the seizure of power would not have a positive effect on European peace. Being a political advisor to David Lloyd George, Jones knew a lot about European politics. What he did not know but wanted to find out was how Stalin had managed to turn the USSR into a thriving economy right in the middle of a global economic crisis.

A colleague helps Mr. Jones (James Norton) get his foot in with the Moscow correspondents scene but by the time Gareth arrives in the capital his contact has already been shot dead during a mugging and his booking has been cut. On the plus side, being in Moscow lets Gareth attend the parties/orgies of press kingpin Walter Duranty (a close friend of Aleister Crowley in real life). As long as he doesn't ask too many questions or attempts to get a closer look at what is happening in Ukraine, an area Gareth's friend was looking into before his death. But of course that is exactly what Jones does and he is suddenly faced with a country gripped by famine and shocking poverty. Not quite the image Stalin's state wants to show the world.
What starts off as a crimel mystery told in strong colours and moody lighting turns into a survival horror story set in a Ukraine that is all deserted monochromatic plains of ice.

Author Andrea Chalupa has added her Ukrainian grandfather's recollections to Jones' story and illustrated it with a connection to George Orwell's "Animal Farm". Through this the film becomes more than just a telling of soviet history, turning into a parable on modern politics and media in its own right. And as technically accomplished and aggreable as the production may appear, it also makes you want to find out more about the bigger picture, the era and this MR. JONES.

Christian Klose (indiekino Berlin)

Credits

Original title: Mr. Jones (2019)
PL/GB/UA 2019, 141 min
Language: English, Russian
Genre: Biography, Historical Film, Drama
Director: Agnieszka Holland
Author: Andrea Chalupa
Cast: James Norton, Vanessa Kirby, Peter Sarsgaard

IMDB

Screenings

  • OV Original version
  • OmU Original with German subtitles
  • OmeU Original with English subtitles

Keine Programmdaten vorhanden.

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