The Bosom Friend

The main character of the film is Rene Rupnik, a former math teacher in his forties who lives with his mother in a desolate block of flats. Since his early youth, he has been fascinated by women with large breasts, which he associates with the image of an "earth mother." He never had a particularly close relationship with his own mother, whom he found too "bony." Rene's idealized fantasy figure is actress Senta Berger, whom he sees as the embodiment of what a woman should be. While standing by the blackboard explaining the mathematical principles of sine and cosine—words that in Latin also mean "bosom"—he praises the female form, especially that of Senta Berger. Filmmaker Ulrich Seidl allows the former teacher to freely express his obsessions and desires, intercutting his monologues with scenes from Rene's everyday life.