| 4th February 2000: a man has suddenly come to the fore on the international scene: Jorg Haider, leader of the populist extreme right-wing Austrian party, ready to from a new coalition to govern the country with the conservatives. The other countries of Europe raised strong objections. All of them except Austria appear to understand the serious nature of the situation.
The maker of the film "Vienna, February 2000" - elsewhere a student of German civilisation - was born in Austria but lived all her life in France. She was very shocked by the arrival of the extreme right wing in the Austrian government. Torn between anger and the wish to be with her Austrian family and friends, she finally decided to leave for Vienna to question them and observe their reactions.
Consequently, the film takes the form of a diary, starting in Paris at the beginning of February, when the possible alliance between the extreme right and the Austrian conservative party was announced and continues in Vienna from the 8th to the 19th of February, when the mass demonstration brought together 250,000 people at the Heldenplatz.
The film records the hesitations and fears of its maker, who, during talks with her close friends and relatives, feels now reassured, now apprehensive. Those who speak all live and work in the same quarter of the city and belong more or less to the same age group as Alyssa Verbizh.
They are musicians, students and café waiters. Most of them stay in close contact with one another, but do not always share the same political convictions or the same view of the Austrian crisis.
The enthusiasm of those who resist, however, appears clearly in the shots of the demonstrations and the statements of some of the persons questioned.
| |
