More immediately recognisable as a documentary than most of Seidl’s earlier work in the field, Jesus, You Know employs one of the most private of human experiences — prayer — as a means of revealing the everyday complaints and deepest secrets of its subjects. Seidl shoots each person alone inside soaring medieval or modernist cathedrals, the camera observing as they beseech Jesus as best friend, therapist or fortune teller, and offer up intimate details that range from the mundane to the shocking. As always, Seidl’s gaze keeps a clinical distance, letting his subjects speak for themselves and making the audience interrogate their own reactions to these people who, upon reflection, are perhaps more familiar than we’d care to admit.

Plus The Bosom Friend (Der Busenfreund), Seidl’s intimate and fastidiously composed portrait of Rene Rupnik, a 40-year-old former maths teacher whose interest in trigonometry is matched by his fascination with female anatomy. He has a particular obsession with the Austrian actress Senta Berger.
AUSTRIA • 1997 • SUBTITLED • COLOUR • DIGITAL BETA • 60 MIN