“Run Lola Run/ Lola rennt” Directed by Tom Tykwer.

(Robert) Masseo Davis
Run Lola Run/ Lola rennt”

“Run Lola Run/ Lola rennt” Directed by Tom Tykwer.

Rating: 4.5/5
This film is one of those movies that takes the normative and throws it into a pool of chaos, resulting in a fast paced story in the life of a simple girl on a mission. It is also a film that demonstrates one of the many misconceptions in the film world which is that a movies content and the films form are separate qualities of the movies overall effect. This misconception is usually due to the fact that films are spoken of either in regards to the technical aspects of the films production or the films narrative. The reality is that the two go hand in hand, the way in which the film is portrayed narratively is ultimately the commingling of both the films story and it’s from, making for a breathtaking experience.
Film is a media that has a great many disputes attached to its title. One of these many arguments is in regards to its true purpose, as an art form. Some believe that the one true purpose of film is that it is to be used as a way to recreate reality, and to use that reality to educate, or at least demonstrate, in pursuit of some higher purpose. These types of people fall under the category of realist and have a strong realist belief in the notion of content over form. This notion makes the assumption that film form and content are separate entities, when the truth is the terms coexist and no one term could exist without the other. The Film “Run Lola Run/ Lola rennt” Directed by Tom Tykwer is a film that is very fast paced, and allows the film with a generally simple story to be told with an increased intensity thus heightening the story’s suspense. It demonstrates skillful storytelling of very realistic human values in a style that is very much one onto itself.
“Run Lola Run/ Lola rennt”, shows us that content and form need each other, by having a story that is seemingly normal and contains “real” life qualities while telling it in a unique form separating the film from others that many have similar or relating content.

“…form is the total system which the viewer attributes to the film.”
(Film Art, Bordwell & Thompson, pg50)

The point of content and form is to lead the movie spectators in a general direction, allowing them to feel the tone of the film and ultimately hint at the films meaning and purpose. This being the case If “form is the total system the viewer attributes to the film”, then the films mode of storytelling is the primary source that combines the terms of form and content, making the film both realistic and formal.
There are many films that have relating concepts and storylines, there are even many movies which are the same story that have been remade over and over again, “Romeo & Juliet”, has been made by many directors Baz Luhrmann, Franco Zeffirelli, and many more, there’s “West Side Story”, directed by Jerome Robbins which is an adaptation of the famous story outline of the “Two star crossed lovers”. The films while having related themes express the same story and similar content but when expressed in different ways it makes the film unique.
The storytelling style is the aspect that both combines the terms content and from while making them different individual pieces of art.
“Run Lola Run” is a film that has a very unique style of storytelling. The movie expresses it’s plot three times, like three attempts. The film tells it’s own story three times. This style gives it the room to incorporate many different storytelling techniques. It shows itself with many variations that still heighten the films intensity. “Run Lola Run”, is a film which allows itself to have realistic true to the human experience, content that is expressed in a way that does not take but adds to the films tone.
Questioning love is a very real part of the human experience. There are many times in many places where many people don’t believe in the concept of love. They in turn have a hard time forming relationships because they question their feelings. In “Run Lola Run” There are two scenes that in actuality are presented as the same moment in real time, they just appear in different parts of the films timeline (reel time). The main character Lola (Franka Potente) discusses with her boyfriend Manni (Moritz Bleibtreu) their doubts about there feelings for one another. This sequence is one which demonstrates genuine doubts that real couples have “Your gonna forget me” –Manni, “Why do you love me?... You don’t really know.”- Lola.
There are many movies with gambling scenes, this is a very common activity that has made an abundant appearance on the big screen, and however in the film “Run Lola Run” this sequence was one, which is a metaphor for how her situation is really a high stakes game of chance.
In “Run Lola Run” there were sporadic instance where photographic still frames were taken expressing one of the movie extras life history, or future as a kind of life premonition. These almost random sequences added to the films overall mood and relate to the notion that content and form are in a sense one in the same because they were realistic. The brief photo histories were believable sequences, some funny but “realistic” nonetheless. They in turn were able to attribute to the films quick snappy tempo but themselves being brief, quick snappy.
“Run Lola Run”, is a simple story that can be seen as a film with an extensive amount of meaning. For many people a films meaning is the factor that distinguishes the difference between content and form, when it truth it’s the combining of the two terms which really makes the film meaningful. It is said that in film there are four different types of meaning, not that any one film can only have one of these types they can act on a single film simultaneously, referential meaning, explicit meaning, implicit meaning, and symptomatic meaning.
Referential meaning in short is what the movie is tangibly about.

“A Young women is Germany has twenty minutes to find and bring 100,000 Deutschmarks to her boyfriend before he robs a supermarket.”
(www.imbd.com)

The films explicit meaning and implicit meaning are the major points that the filmmakers purposely put into the film. The explicit is the point of the movie as a whole and the implicit point could be defined as the meaning behind the meaning.
In the Film “Run Lola Run” it could be said that the explicit meaning of this film is a girl would go to great lengths to help the man she loves, no matter how many tries it takes.
This would a typical assessment of an explicit purpose of the film. The implicit meaning could be along the lines of; though a girl would go beyond many lengths to save the man she loves it many not be her help he needs, things may find a way to work themselves out.
In the end of the film there is implications to what I find to be the films symptomatic meaning, the meaning that the filmmakers do not need to have an awareness of. The film implies that that life is a game of chance, that all things are merely a series of lucky situations and coincidences. The realistic content of “Run Lola Run” is a function of the movie therefore apart of the films form, making content and form one in the same.