Fatherland

Pawel Pawlikowski's new film, Fatherland, is playing at Exeter Phoenix in Studio 74, starting Friday 6 November. It's a 2026 release, 88 minutes long, and rated 12A.

The story centres on the relationship between the Nobel Prize-winning writer Thomas Mann and his daughter Erika, an actress, writer and rally driver. It's set in the summer of 1949, at the height of the Cold War, and the two of them set off on a challenging and emotional road trip in a black Buick across a Germany in ruins, travelling from US-dominated Frankfurt to Soviet-controlled Weimar. Mann is returning home after sixteen years of exile in the US, and he finds himself facing not only a divided fatherland but a deep fracture within his own family.

It's the kind of thing Pawlikowski has been doing for a while now. He picks up where he left off with Ida and Cold War, working in his elliptic and distilled way to look at identity, family, love and guilt amid the turmoil and confusion of post-war Europe. If you've seen those two, you'll recognise the territory he's returning to here.

There are plenty of screenings to choose from over the first week. On Friday 6 November, there's a matinee at 1.30pm and an evening showing at 8.20pm. Saturday 7 November has one at 8pm, Monday 9 November at 5.20pm, and Tuesday 10 November runs a double with a 2pm and an 8.20pm. Wednesday 11 November is 6pm, and Thursday 12 November is 8.20pm. Tickets are £9, with £7 for members and £5 for students and under-25s, plus a £1.50 ticketing system charge.