IN JULY

Don't be fooled by the portentous prologue: two desperate men, a car on an arid Bulgarian plain, and a flyblown corpse. IN JULY is a sexy and uproarious road comedy, easily the CIFF's best date flick. Daniel, a straight-laced, science-teaching assistant in Hamburg, thinks he's found the element of happiness that's been such a void in his universe, after free-spirited Juli presents him with a mystic ring that she says will lead him toward his ideal woman. She means herself and intends to tell him so that evening. But by chance he stumbles across Melek first. She's a beguiling Turk (her name means “angel”) who spends a chaste night at Daniel's and then catches her flight to Istanbul for a midsummer rendezvous by the Bosphorus. She must be the one, Daniel decides. He follows her, and – by chance again – takes Juli along for the ride. She's alternately charmed and exasperated by her love-smitten traveling companion who only has eyes for another; meanwhile Daniel's calamity-strewn route through southeastern Europe turns the once-tweedy scholar into a barroom brawler, car thief, stowaway, fugitive and prisoner. By the end of his odyssey a new Daniel emerges, one who finally knows the true meaning of “good chemistry.” (In German, Romanian and Turkish with English subtitles)