There’s something uniquely creative about Susanna Nicchiarelli’s Nico, 1988 – and while much of it falls short, it’s hard not to admire it for being, well, different. In this regards the film is entirely representative of it’s eponymous subject Christa Paffgen, otherwise known as Nico, who is best known for her work completed with The Velvet Underground.
Nico (Trine Dyrholm) is fed up of looking back, focused only on the future as she embarks on a European tour to promote her new material. She’s still addicted to drugs, and seems to float aimlessly between people and things like an enigma. She’s joined on tour with her mediocre band, and Richard (John Gordon Sinclair) who takes it upon himself to manage her tour, and life, and ensure her music reaches the audiences it deserves to. Along the way she has to grapple with her own addictions and inner demons, all the while compelled to reconnect with her long lost son Ari (Sandor Funtek).
We adopt the perspective of Nico, and this makes for a beguiling, unpredictable film. Things just sort of happen, and we drift between people, fans and musicians, never really settling for any sustained period of time, simply because she isn’t really able to. The unique narrative structure may deter some, but the performance by Dyrholm will have everybody on side, for it’s a quite remarkable turn by the esteemed Danish actress, so nuanced and subtle, as she just becomes Nico, emphatically, and with a great deal of conviction, spiked persistently with a vital sense of vulnerability that the role requires.
Though be warned, if you aren’t a fan of Nico’s work, particularly the later material she was promoting on this haphazard tour, then you better get used to shutting off occasionally, for it features heavily in this movie, and let’s just say it’s of a somewhat acquired taste. Though no matter what your relationship is like with the music, it still serves a real purpose, as for all its flaws it came from the heart, and she was a woman who found it difficult to articulate her emotions; this was the only way she knew how. So given this is a biopic and there’s a duty to try and understand the subject, then it seems only fair we access this through the one medium she truly let us in.
