The movie starts with two quotes selected by director Tom Tykwer. The first, by poet T. S. Eliot, says, "We shall not cease from exploration and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time". The second, by German soccer coach S. Herberger, says, "after the game is before the game". Unlike other movies, these are not pedantic quotations, but are really directly linked to the way the story is presented and filmed.
The story is shot three times, with slight differences regarding the positioning of the actors, slightly different timing in the action, and changes in the possible scenes, which produce dramatically different endings and future predictions for all the characters. Only the scene regarding Lola's mum, shot in pastels while she's talking on the phone, does not change in the movie. Unlike other movies of the sort, this is not a pre-deterministic movie. The message of the movie, to me, is that the fact that you ran faster doesn't mean that you're going to get there earlier. For that to happen, you'll need to run in the right direction, at the proper pace, and have a bit of luck. Life is a game, a net of chances, and minor changes bring dramatic different endings. Lola has three different ways of approaching the same challenge, and has three lives, like in a video-game, to succeed.
Although the movie is action-packed, its core is grounded in the deep love the couple has, which is explained in infra-red coloured flashbacks with both characters in bed talking about their relationship. Without that, the movie would have been just another ran and catch story. Another great thing is that the roles are reversed in this film: the hero is a woman trying to rescue her man from trouble, not the opposite; she takes the lead, she is the one running and making things happen.
The movie was shot in three different formats, steady video-cam for the running action scenes, 35mm movie cam (colour, BW and infra-red) for the settled steady scenes, with an important animated clip that serves as credits opening but then becomes part of the story. The movie contains present, past and future action, and uses split screens effectively to show relevant events happening to both Manni and Lola.
Colour is very important in this movie, but not overwhelmingly so. There are very bright colour enhancements that break the visual monotony of the urban settings and the settled interior scenes: Lola's red-orange hair perfectly matches her blue-green pastel outfit, the orange ambulance, the men in yellow carrying the big glass, the blood-red telephone, and the infra-red scenes, among others. Moreover, the flashbacks are shot in B&W, while the flash-forwards of the secondary characters are shot in subdued colours, very much like a worn out movie of the 1970s would look like.
I loved the OST and selection of songs, whose lyrics perfectly describe what is happening in the story, and the mood of the characters and scene at the precise moment it is playing. The beat of the movie, the one that gives its pace and rhythm to it, is the techno-song sung by Potente, a catchy powerful and repetitive piece that also matches perfectly Lola's determination and angst; it has also something of video-game music, in a way, as the running without the music would look somewhat deflated.
Franka Potente honours her surname and has a great energy in this film. She runs with a great easiness and power. She is also able to stop and act dramatically, be sweet, nasty, crazy - always fresh and believable. Moritz Bleibtreu shows a great dramatic talent to showcase his character in the few minutes that he has on camera. The rest of the cast are also good in their respective roles (Herbert Knaup as Lola's father; Nina Petri as Frau Hansen, the mistress of Lola's father; Armin Rohde as bank security guard Schuster, and Ludger Pistor as Mr Meier, among others).
Two main flaws. The opening of the movie after the credits, with hundreds of people moving around and some questions being posed to the spectator, is really pretentious, and I thought does not add anything to the script or the movie in general, especially because the two initial quotations already establish the concept around which the movie revolves. There is a goof, too, in the scene of Lola talking to Manni through the glass window of the supermarket, which has no verisimilitude; however, the mood and energy of the film is such at that moment that this does not matter or bother the viewer, who believes it.
A great action movie, super-entertaining, with more depth that one can think at first sight.
