Midlife angst, well done

Among the films screening in the AFI Fest 2002’s Made in Germany series is Andreas Dresen’s briskly compelling “Grill Point,” at the ArcLight on Saturday and Sunday. It captures perfectly the edgy mood of two middle-class couples for whom life is going stale as they approach 40.

The film takes its title from a popular riverside food stand in the bleak industrial city of Frankfurt on the Oder in Eastern Germany. It is owned by the burly Uwe (Axel Prahl), who works such long hours to make it a success that he has neglected his family, his wife, Katrin (Gabriela Maria Schmeide), in particular. This makes her vulnerable to Uwe’s best friend Chris (Thorsten Merten), a radio DJ, now that the bloom has faded from his own marriage to the dutiful Ellen (Steffi Kuhnert).

Dresen reveals the excruciating pain and dark humor that erupts when Chris and Katrin’s affair is, inevitably, discovered, and how these very real and basically straightforward people deal with their predicament. The outcome proves unpredictable as the four discover unexpected truths about themselves and each other.

Since Dresen, who pulls no punches in depicting the selfishness of passion’s onslaught, matches his deep compassion with equal detachment, never judging anyone, he leaves us suspecting that viewers will vary widely in regard to which of these characters they will identify and sympathize with.

Antonio Hernandez’s “The City of No Limits,” which the AFI Fest 2002 presents at the ArcLight Friday and Saturday, is a taut, understated psychological mystery in which the veteran Spanish star Fernando Fernan Gomez plays a wealthy, terminally ill Spanish business tycoon whose family has gathered around him at a Paris hospital. Apparently, he is in the grip of a fear that he won’t be able to get a timely warning to someone in danger named Rancel.

His relatives regard him as delirious, but when his youngest son (Leonardo Sbaraglia) arrives from Argentina, he gradually becomes convinced that his father’s distress may not be merely imaginary but actually be connected with some dark incident in the past.

Although his film is sleekly conventional, Hernandez does raise some dire plot possibilities, starting with some possible chicanery on the part of the tycoons’ two oldest sons. The youngest son also faces some romantic complications as he begins playing detective through a thicket of vague allusions made by his father.The film, in all its convolutions, retains its credibility, if not always its clarity, to the finish. “The City of No Limits” has a strong payoff and shows off a notable cast that includes Geraldine Chaplin, who exudes an icy authority as the elegant matriarch of the family.

*

Screenings

“Grill Point”

Saturday at 8:45 p.m. and Sunday at 4:30 p.m. at the ArcLight Hollywood, 6360 Sunset Blvd. (866) AFI-FEST.

“The City of No Limits”

Friday at 9:45 p.m. and Saturday at 4:30 p.m. at the ArcLight Hollywood.