Would you lie to save your life? What if this lie meant losing the love of your life? These are the questions our protagonist is left to ponder in the German film Transit, directed by Christian Petzold. It’s a classic story of fight or flight set against a dark backdrop of wartime uncertainty and one man’s life-changing decision when he realizes that his survival is on the line.

Assuming a new identity for survival

Georg (Franz Rogowski) is a German refugee trapped in France due to the (purposefully vague- more on that later) occupation of Paris. He carries a couple of letters which he intends to deliver to a writer named Weidel in Marseilles- who we come to find out is actually deceased. With nothing more than the clothes on his back and a small wad of cash, Georg sneaks aboard a train heading to Marseilles. Once there, he attempts to deliver the letters to the local consulate when a mix-up occurs, and officers assume Georg to be the dead author. With this new identity comes a Visa, a passport, and most importantly, safety. What Georg didn’t expect, however, was that he would fall in love with Marie (Paula Beer), the wife of the dead writer whose identity he has assumed.

Modern-ish look at events of the 1940s

Transit is poised as a modern adaptation of Anna Seghers’ classic 1944 novel when the Nazi invasion of Europe was an imminent threat. And while Transit manages to capture the overall tone of era-depression, it is a confusing directorial choice to attempt to keep this time period “neutral.” This past-meets-present-meets-timelessness feels like a trope that isn’t accurately addressed in the film, nor does it work to blend characteristics of these decades to create an “other world.” The clothing, props, absence of technology, and communication by hand-written letters seem like an obvious nod to the WWII era- so I don’t understand why Petzold strayed from this obvious (and seemingly smarter) narrative. The theme of refugees and is timeless, of course, as we continue to deal with this issue today. But marketing Transit as an unconventional time warp period piece feels quite misleading.

Certain directorial choices are questionable

Adapting a novel into a film inherently comes with a number of obstacles as well as criticism from the book’s fanbase. Most importantly, how the director chooses to handle the impossible task of cramming hundreds of pages into an hour and a half can undoubtedly lead to rushed storylines or plot holes. The directorial choice to incorporate a third person narrator seems to be necessary, as this provides context and backstory to this fast-moving sequence of events. However, the revelation of the man behind the voiceover being the town’s local bartender was a bit of a letdown which left me questioning who he was in relation to the story. How he would know what’s going on when Georg is alone? It just doesn’t click.

An unconventional leading man

Franz Rogowski is an interesting protagonist who broods at the right moments, and his internal confliction between his true self and faux self is the film’s emotional strength. Rogowski’s quirks, which include traces of a former cleft palate and a noticeable speech impediment, make him an unlikely leading man but this doesn’t stop him from taking the bull by the horns and giving his all to this character- which requires more internal conflict than external. For a film based around a lie, Transit has a strong narrative foundation, however, the indistinguishable time period, along with other questionable directorial choices, play too melodramatic to be memorable.

Transit is 101 minutes. Not rated. Opening this Friday at the Laemmle Royal.