Head-On is the best film I have seen this calendar year*. Even if it is not the tale of some grumpy London music hater (who I understand is restarting her tale of her mammoth global circumnavigation via music hatred this afternoon). Instead it is one of those “extreme Romeo & Juliet” films, a phrase which often neglects HOW EXTREME R&J actually were. Let us just say it is an idiosyncratic love story where two German Turks meet at a clinic after failed suicide attempts, marry and fall in love in that order. Then other stuff happens, usually involving blood, swearing and mid-eighties synth-pop.
There are some interesting threads which can be teased out from Head-On about love, life and the place of the Other in society. This is a love story which ranges from Germany to Istanbul, and in and out of various institutions. Nevertheless it is one of the most surprising films I have seen, one which genuinely leads you down an intriguing narrative path on a couple of occasions.
Most strikingly though is the cyclical nature of suicide attempts in the film. In particular, that both leads go into their suicidal benders listening to I Feel You by Depeche Mode. And I think we know what the local Headon would say about that.
*This may or may not be true, but I want someone else to go and see it to disagree. Put it like this is was the film where the disjuncture between expectation and actuality has weighed heaviest on the positive side.