For jazz aficionados, the title of the movie, Köln 75, says it all. They will know that it refers to a concert by Keith Jarrett, an improvisation that was recorded and became the bestselling solo jazz record of all time.
Jazz buffs will certainly want to see this movie, which opens in theaters across Israel on Thursday, but it isn’t only for those who are into improvisational jazz.
Köln 75 is an offbeat, enjoyable look at Vera Brandes (Mala Emde), the engaging, ambitious 18-year-old high school student who organized this concert and made it happen. It’s about a love for music more than it is about music itself, and it’s a tale of a magnificent obsession.
The film is part of a mini-genre of movies about people organizing concerts and music festivals, like the genial comedy Taking Woodstock, and, of course, many documentaries about concerts and music festivals such as Woodstock, Gimme Shelter, and Summer of Soul.
But there are a few key differences, because Köln 75 focuses on jazz, not rock; it takes place in Europe rather than the US; and the protagonist is a young woman in a society and an industry that are still very sexist.
The movie portrays the balance between child and adult
Köln 75, directed by Israel-born, New York-based Ido Fluk, is a little like The Big Short at times, in that it features moments when various characters stop the action and break the fourth wall.
The movie opens at Vera’s 50th birthday party, where she is surrounded by affectionate friends, but the event is marred by the presence of her judgmental, cold father, who never saw anything of value in her life’s work of promoting and arranging jazz concerts.
The movie then turns back to the early 1970s, the era in which it spends most of its running time. Vera, at 16, frequents Köln jazz concerts with her friend Isa (Shirin Lilly Eissa), a budding revolutionary.
Lying and saying she is 25, she attracts the attention of Ronnie Scott (Daniel Betts), the frontman of a British jazz trio. He tells her he is sure that with her brash, seductive style, she can get him booked at jazz clubs all over Germany.
Taking up the challenge, which comes with a promise of 10% of Scott’s earnings from these bookings, Vera throws herself into it, pretending to be British because she feels that will impress people.
She has to hide all of this activity from her bitter, disapproving father (Ulrich Tukur), a frustrated painter who works as a dentist. She still lives at home with him and her tense, chain-smoking mother (Jordis Triebel) and her unemployed brother (Leo Meier).
Soon, Vera is so successful that she moves into her own apartment, where she spends time with her boyfriend and one-night stands.
When a newspaper publishes an article about her success, in an interview where she flirts with the journalist and misquotes a famous line from a Godard film about immortality, her parents find out what she is up to.
Her new calling doesn’t please them, to put it mildly. Meanwhile, she is still attending high school during the day.
Once she hears the American jazz pianist, Keith Jarrett (John Magaro), known for his lengthy improvisations, it changes her already volatile life.
Vera falls in love with the music, not the man, and she has one goal from then on: To book a major concert for Jarrett in Köln.
The story of Vera’s quest is interrupted intermittently by scenes with Michael Watts (Michael Chernus), a music journalist who has come to Germany to try to interview the elusive Jarrett.
In these scenes, he gives short explanations about the history of jazz music and the way that characters guided viewers through the history of the stock market in The Big Short.
These scenes make it clear why Jarrett, who went from playing with Miles Davis and other musicians to solo concert improvisations, was such a revolutionary figure in music.
While they are clever, the explanations are a little annoying, but they do explain why his music was so important.
Jarrett is presented as a low-key, intense figure, tormented by a bad back and a drive to prove himself in concert after concert, who is haunted by a fear of failure. Audiences in the US weren’t paying much attention, so he has come to Europe, where a devoted assistant drives him from gig to gig, and they barely have money for food or lodging.
Vera bursts into his world, promising she can fill a huge auditorium without having the vaguest idea of whether she can really make it happen or how to go about it.
Although anyone who has heard the album knows that the show did in fact go on, Emde’s intense performance as Vera and a fine script will somehow keep you on the edge of your seat, especially during the last third.
Anyone who has ever tried to get any kind of event off the ground will identify with Vera, and this film will also be a treat for those who enjoy music and concert-going.