by Zsolt Gyenge/Talent Press

"Tickets" was one of the most eagerly awaited films of this year's Berlinale. Shown out of competition, this sketch film, which brings together three famous filmmakers (Ermanno Olmi, Abbas Kiarostami and Ken Loach, presents a train trip from Central-Europe to Rome. The three directors tell three different stories but the location and some of the characters are present in all three films. In fact, it is not right to say three films because the parts are not strictly divided as usual, and we almost have a continuous story, where only the accent put on different characters changes.

The first problem which arises is how the three “auteurs” managed to work together, how they succeeded to do separate films within the same structure. Both filmmakers present at the discussion – Loach and Kiarostami – argued that everybody made his own movie. “There is no other way of working, you have to follow the internal logic of your own subject”, Loach said. Kiarostami added that real communication between them begun only when linking the parts together. Not only three directors, but three different cultures and languages were brought together for the movie. For Kiarostami, the shooting proved that “language is not the most important thing because you can communicate with your physionomy, with your faces and with your eyes.” So cultural differences can be overcome.

Asked about the element common to all three directors, Loach said: “What we share is the attempt to reduce things to the simplest way of explaining something. Reducing and clarifying is not what you see in most films which tend to exaggerate, to make things dramatic. That kind of simplicity, clarity and economy is something we would like to share.”

The fact that the three directors managed to keep some kind of unity and to introduce their personal style into their episodes makes this movie special. Both Loach and Kiarostami pointed out that they consider that Olmi`s style is different from what they are doing. Even so,Kiarostami said that the common location and some of the characters bring these three styles together. Loach spoke about “the sensibility, the awareness of human interaction” which he thinks is similar, even if the style is different. He also talked about the liberating effect of the constraints of shooting in a train. “You have to concentrate on the absolute essence of what you want to do. So it's like a musical form: you have to work within very strict structures.”

We can't ignore that this movie – especially Loach's segment – has political connotations, so this question appeared during the discussion too. The English director talked about the gesture of the Celtic fans who shared what they had with the Albanian refugees. He compared this to the reaction of the world to the tsunami appeal. He argued that everybody put his hand in the pocket, because all of this was encouraged by the media and politicians, but nobody does the same thing with the people killed in Iraq.

Three styles are put together in the same small world of a train and, despite the differences, something seems to unite the visions.

[Zsolt Gyenge from Romania founded a Cine-Club that became a monthly film magazing. He has been a critic for Filmtett since its launch in 2000, writing film reviews, interviews with film professionals, and articles about film festivals. In 2003 he started a PhD program in film theory.]