Rubber

The plot itself being established as one big 'Verfremdungseffekt', Rubber is a homage to the absurdity of cinematic storytelling. In a series of dramatically composed, road-movie like scenes, we follow a tire waking to life in the middle of the desert, rolling along the highway and turning into a serial killer in the pursuit of love.

Apart from us, there is a diegetic audience watching this staged cinematic happening (through binoculars) on site. Thus, as we watch a bizarre story unfold in seemingly random ways, we are denied cinematic immersion not only due to the grotesqueness of the plot, but additionally through the reflection of our gaze in the diegetic audience that is being ridiculed by the filmmakers.

Yet, as much as Rubber is constructed on a self-deprecating meta level, it indulges the enthrallment of high definition imagery and subtle sound production. As the main “character” neither speaks, nor expresses itself with any emotional mimic, a rich soundscape and dramatically focused close-ups converge to establish and maintain a multilayered, accurately choreographed dramaturgy.