Sound of Falling (2025) review

Multiple generations of females live in the German Altmark region and have different life experiences: in the 1910's, little Alma (Hanna Heckt) and her sisters see their brother Fritz (Filip Schnack) fall from a ladder and have his lower left leg amputated, then in the 1980's extroverted Angelika (Lena Urzendowsky) receives sexual attention from her uncle Uwe (Konstantin Lindhorst) and, in the modern day, Lenka (Laeni Geiseler) forms a strong friendship with Kaya (Ninel Geiger).  Director Schilinski is certainly aware of recent films involving youngsters, such as Tótem and Petite Maman, and seems to want to evoke a kind of nostalgia, except her feature has the gall to flip around time frames with no explanations for the shifts, doesn't bother with any "traditional" character development and is continuously dispensing with shallow philosophy (like a poor imitation of Jeffrey Eugenides' wonderful novel The Virgin Suicides).  The title should have been Sound of Death since the overriding theme is mortality, but the filmmaker has nothing of substance say about it - aside from the fact that it's inevitable - and although there are a few memorable images (the concluding shot is a stunner), the material could have used a tighter grip ... sort of like the one quiet maid Trudi (Luzia Oppermann) has on her "patient."