Trip to Asia - Die Suche nach dem Einklang (2008)

Director:

Thomas Grube

Writer:

Thomas Grube (writer)

Release Date:

28 February 2008 (Germany)

Genre:

Documentary | Music

Plot:

Director Thomas Grube (RHYTHM IS IT!) and his accomplished film crew accompany the Berlin Philharmonic on a concert tour into six pulsating...

Cast

Simon Rattle	...	Himself
Virginie Reibel	...	Herself - Piccoloflöte
Micha Afhkam	...	Himself - Bratsche
Raphael Haeger	...	Himself - Schlagzeug
Long Yu	...	Himself
Martin Stegner	...	Himself - Bratsche
Daniel Stabrawa	...	Himself - 1. Konzertmeister
Toru Yasunaga	...	Himself - 1. Konzertmeister
Albrecht Mayer	...	Himself - Oboe
Stanley Dodds	...	Himself - 2. Violine
Sarah Willis	...	Herself - Horn
Thomas Timm	...	Himself - 2. Violine
Wieland Welzel	...	Himself - Pauken
Martin von der Nahmer	...	Himself - Bratsche
Manfred Preis	...	Himself - Bassklarinette
Franz Schindlbeck	...	Himself - Schlagzeug
Götz Teutsch	...	Himself - Violoncello
Edicson Ruiz	...	Himself - Kontrabass
Aline Champion	...	Herself - 1. Violine
Walter Seyfarth	...	Himself - Klarinette
Jelka Weber	...	Herself - Flöte
Thomas Adés	...	Himself
Gábor Tarkövi	...	Himself - Trompete
Wilfried Strehle	...	Himself - Bratsche
Dominik Wollenweber	...	Himself - Englischhorn
Fredi Müller	...	Himself - Schlagzeug
Olaf Maninger	...	Himself - Violoncello
Klaus Stoll	...	Himself - Kontrabass
Naoko Shimizu	...	Herself - Bratsche
Rainer Seegers	...	Himself - Pauken
Christoph Hartmann	...	Himself - Oboe
Maja Avramovic	...	Herself - 1. Violine
Klaus Wallendorf	...	Himself - Horn
Henning Trog	...	Himself - Fagott
Fergus McWilliam	...	Himself - Horn
Meiji Schrein	...	Himself
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Berliner Philharmoniker

Directed by
Thomas Grube

Writing credits (in alphabetical order)
Thomas Grube		writer

Produced by
Chen On Chu	....	producer: Hongkong
Uwe Dierks	....	producer
Thomas Grube	....	producer
Peter Hermann	....	executive producer
Peter Hermann	....	line producer
Patrick Huang	....	producer: Taipeh (as Patrick Mao Huang)
Richard Kipnis	....	producer: Tokyo
Anca Monica Pandelca	....	producer
Marc Wächter	....	executive producer
Olav Wagner	....	associate producer
Alan Yentob	....	producer

Original Music by
Simon Stockhausen

Cinematography by
René Dame
Anthony Dod Mantle
Alberto Venzago

Film Editing by
Martin Hoffmann

Production Management
Jeong-min Bae	....	production manager
Michael Barlow	....	production manager
Vigo Fan	....	production manager
Axel Johannis	....	unit manager
Sam Kong	....	production manager
Yingli Ma	....	production manager
Caroline Paethke	....	post-production supervisor (as Caroline Päthke)
Kai Bernhard Schmidt	....	production manager
Undine Simmang	....	post-production supervisor

Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
Lukas Macher	....	assistant director

Sound Department
Florian Beck	....	sound re-recording mixer
Philipp Bitter	....	foley editor
Pascal Capitolin	....	sound mixer
Pascal Capitolin	....	sound
Klaus-Peter Gross	....	sound
Robert Jäger	....	sound re-recording mixer
Tom Korr	....	sound re-recording mixer
Tom Korr	....	supervising sound editor
Albrecht Leu	....	assistant sound
Kai Mielisch	....	sound
Andreas Prescher	....	sound: second unit
Carsten Richter	....	foley artist
Simon Stockhausen	....	sound designer
Bernd von Bassewitz	....	sound mixer
Bernd von Bassewitz	....	sound
Hanse Warns	....	foley mixer

Visual Effects by
Andrei Dimitru	....	visual effects
Vera Jeske Younan	....	digital colorist (as Vera Jeske)
Florian Obrecht	....	visual effects

Camera and Electrical Department
Holger Braune	....	second camera
Stefan Ciupek	....	camera operator
Tommy Mann	....	assistant camera

Editorial Department
Emmelie Mansee	....	assistant editor (as Emmelie Mansée)
Christian Struck	....	post-production coordinator

Music Department
Simon Rattle	....	musical director

Other crew
Anne Butschek	....	titles
Stefan Ciupek	....	high definition consultant

Production Companies

• BoomtownMedia GmbH & Co.
• British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC)
• Zweites Deutsches Fernsehen (ZDF)

Distributors

• Axiom Films (2008) (UK) (theatrical)
• Cetera International (2008) (Japan) (theatrical)
• Films Sans Frontières 2 (2008) (France) (theatrical)
• Gutek Film (2008) (Poland) (theatrical)
• Piffl Medien (2008) (Germany) (theatrical)
• Poly Film (2008) (Austria) (theatrical)
• Xenix Filmdistribution (2008) (Switzerland) (theatrical)

Other Companies

• Berliner Philharmoniker  group cast members
• Filmförderungsanstalt (FFA)  funding
• Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburg  funding
• Tonstudio Hanse Warns  foley stage

Also Known As:

Trip to Asia (Germany) (short title)
Trip to Asia: The Quest for Harmony (International: English title)

Runtime:

108 min

Country:

Germany

Language:

German | English | Spanish

Colour:

Colour

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital

Certification:

Switzerland:7 (canton of Vaud) | Switzerland:7 (canton of Geneva)

Filming Locations:

Beijing, China

Company:

BoomtownMedia GmbH & Co.

Quotes:

Simon Rattle: "Einklang" is what we aspire to.

The power of the music to touch us is palpable

Carrying on in the rich tradition of famed Berlin Philharmonic conductors Von Bulow, Nikisch, Furtwangler, Celibidache, von Karajan, and Claudio Abbado, Sir Simon Rattle's enormous talent and charismatic personality are in full view in Thomas Grube's moving documentary Trip to Asia: The Quest for Harmony. The film was shot during the orchestra's concert tour in Asia that brought them to Beijing, Seoul, Shanghai, Hong Kong, Taipei, and Tokyo. While it provides only a superficial sense of the destinations, the power of the music to touch us is palpable and the intimate look at the musicians' and their personal struggles is compelling.

The Berlin Philharmonic, one of the premier orchestras in the world, is a self-governing public foundation with the power to make its own artistic and financial decisions, a condition insisted on by Rattle when he signed in 2002, and this decision making power is evident when we learn that several orchestra members are on a lengthy probation and will be voted in or out when the tour comes to an end. It becomes quite clear that simply having a love for music and being technically impeccable is not all that is required. There is that elusive fit with the orchestra that is hard to define but becomes clear after an extended tour.

Trip to Asia features powerful performances of music by Richard Strauss (Ein Heldenleben, A Hero's Life), Ludwig von Beethoven (Eroica Symphony), and the modern composer Thomas Ades, whose Asyla is introduced. Grube supplements the concerts with interviews with the musicians who reflect on how well they cope with the competition, the desire for recognition, the loneliness of hours and hours of solo practice, and the enormous pressure for excellence they face every time they go on stage. Some speak to the camera and talk about how they were always loners and never felt accepted at school and how their instrument allowed them to offer something unique to others and to take pride in who they are, perhaps for the first time.

The 126 musicians of the Philharmonic know from experience how crucial it is to subordinate their individual personalities to the greater good of an organization, and the documentary is as much about the aspirations and self-doubts of individual performers as it is about the orchestra and its artistic achievements. Rattle is intense as he talks about what it is like to perform in an orchestra steeped in its own rules and traditions. "All of us", he says, "go through things that demands a pulling together of our disparate parts. The minute you start thinking it's about you, you're in crisis. When you don't believe that the music is something much greater, you have a problem." The grind on the musicians is evident and also on the camera crew. As the director describes it, "The team has gotten only three hours of sleep a night since our arrival in China. We're beat, not just because of the time difference, but because we rise before the orchestra and go to sleep after they do." The film documents the grueling travel, the rehearsals and the master classes, the stresses that build up before a performance and, for some, not knowing if they will spend their life with the orchestra or move on to a different career. The high point of the film is the enthusiastic reception in a public square in Taipei where 30,000 people cheer the orchestra. After that, the final stop in Tokyo seems anti-climactic and the end of the tour is finally heartbreaking for those who learn they are not accepted as revealed in the closing credits.