The surveyor K. (Ulrich Mühe) has been ordered to work in a castle in a remote village. When he reports to the castle, he is refused entry. Despite repeated attempts Klamm, the person K. has to talk to, is never available. K. has to make do with Arthur and Jeremiah, who introduce themselves as Klamm’s assistants, but they turn out not to be able to offer any assistance. K.’s efforts to get into the castle are as fruitless as his attempts to find his feet in the local village. The more K. does his best, the further he is removed from his goal. The castle bureaucracy turns out to be as arbitrary as it is impenetrable. K. is forced to remain the person he was on the day he arrived: a stranger who is only just tolerated.îThat is, briefly, the plot of Kafka’s famous novel. Haneke’s film version follows the written text closely. The film is divided into chapters of equal length and is almost exclusively set at night. The director wanted to stress the realistic elements of this grotesque parable rather than the absurd. Haneke, well known in Rotterdam with his wayward and increasingly oppressive oeuvre, has this to say: ‘Cold is an increasingly important theme for me. Man struck dumb, the impossibility to communicate: that is something I experience more and more strongly.’
