'Wetlands' an unexpected German gem

The first thing you need to do when it comes to the German-language teen dramedy Wetlands (Feuchtgebiete) is to forget everything you've heard about the film, including its inept marketing campaign which sells it as a postfeminist gross-out sex comedy drenched in bodily fluids - you know, a sort of American Pie for the women's studies set.

Adapted by director David Wnendt from Charlotte Roche's wildly successful 2008 autobiographical novel, Wetlands is one of the most daring, visually arresting, innovative, and imaginative examples of filmmaking to come out of Europe in recent memory.

It's that rare thing, a truly Rabelaisan coming-of-age story about sex, love, and family that's equally hilarious, emotionally engaging, and downright intelligent. And yes, it also has some seriously gross gags (ahem) about the corporeality of sexual coupling and the general messiness of being human.

Carla Juri gives a brave, jaw-dropping performance as the film's heroine and narrator Helen, a high school student who has decided to rebel against her mother's sometimes obscene obsession with cleanliness and order by turning her body into "a living . . . hygiene experiment."

Her adventures include a visit to a filthy public bathroom flooded with a thick, brownish brine to sit unprotected on the toilet seat, and a session that has her use various vegetables as sex toys.

As extreme as they are, Wnendt uses these scenes as gateways into Helen's inner life, her fantasies, her childhood memories, and her fragmented, frustrated attempts to deal with a string of emotional traumas she suffered when she was 8, including her parents' divorce.

Throughout, the film bristles with raw energy, conveying in each scene a sense of vitality and jouissance at life's possibilities.

Wetlands deals with sexuality and other matters of the body - including the correct application of hemorrhoid ointment - with a frankness that's disarming, to say the least. But it also accomplishes an emotional depth and complexity you're not likely to find in American Pie.

Directed by David Wnendt. With Carla Juri, Christoph Letkowski, Marlen Kruse, Meret Becker, Axel Milberg. Distributed by Strand Releasing. In German with subtitles.

Running time: 1 hour, 45 mins.

Parent's guide: Not rated (language, nudity, graphic sex, scatalogical humor, smoking)

Playing at: Ritz at the Bourse.

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