My Sentence

Amina Handke adapts the 1967 theatre play Kaspar written by her father Peter Handke. Instead of a young man being tortured by language, we meet an old woman played by the director’s mother, Libgart Schwarz, who loses her linguistic abilities while rehearsing for the very same play. What begins as a pure and playful family meta-fiction turns into a surreal, partly nonsensical Babylonian confusion, it’s just that it’s not different languages that are clashing but layers and fragments of the German language, the language of the father. The film avoids the traps of representational cinema. It’s all noises and muttering, injunctions and an almost Dadaist pleasure in repeating sentences until they completely lose their meaning.

Directed by Amina Handke, My Sentence leans on a strong ensemble — Libgart Schwarz, Helga Illich, Caroline Peters — to carry a story that balances spectacle with character.

The film landed with audiences for its craft and performances, and remains one of the most talked-about drama titles of 2022.