18/24

A former martial artist hired to train three wealthy Jordanian sisters finds her "dream job" unsettling, as the isolated young women are constantly watched and show no interest in the sport. Why was she really hired? Her first feature film is called SUN, the current one is MOON, so it will be interesting to see what Austrian director Kurdwin AYUB names his third film. Sarah (Florentina HOLZINGER) from Vienna has to give up her MMA career after a losing fight and becomes self-employed as a personal trainer. Things don’t go so well when she receives an interesting offer from Amman, Jordan. According to her charming Arab interlocutor, she is to work as a personal trainer for his three sisters so that the ladies don’t get too bored. At first, everything goes well. Sarah is staying in a luxury hotel in Amman with almost no guests, and then she gradually gets to know her three charges. However, it gradually becomes clear that something cannot be right in this family. A shocking situation occurs at the siblings’ luxurious mansion. Sarah is put to a severe test that challenges her fighting spirit. As with the first film, director AYUB has once again collaborated with Ulrich SEIDL’s film production company. It certainly has its own theme and style, but it shares SEIDL’s mercilessly dissecting view of social conditions. Its leading actress Florentina HOLZINGER is a real discovery. With her performance of SANCTA based on the opera SANCTA SUSANNA by Paul HINDEMITH in 2024, the choreographer really shook up several opera houses and caused a stir on the German-language feature pages. The footage (camera: Klemens HUFNAGL) from Jordan is also instructive and spectacular. You have certainly never seen such a large city in the Arab world on the big screen. The film itself is structured like a classic thriller at times, but it cleverly subverts the audience’s expectations of such films. You can already look forward to Kurdwin AYUB’s next film, which will definitely be called STERNE.

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