At the heart of Silent Friend is a ginkgo tree that is almost two hundred years old. The tree has stood on the campus of a German university since 1832, long before the characters who gather around it began to unfold their lives, loves and ideas across three timelines. Silent and unperturbed, it bears witness to human history.  

With her characteristic sensitivity, Ildikó Enyedi explores how we perceive the world and how much usually escapes our notice.
Silent Friend invites us to look beyond the human perspective and to experience nature not as a backdrop, but as an independent, present and observing force.  

The film is a reflection on time, consciousness and our relationship with the non-human world. Set against the brief span of a human life stands the nearly two-hundred-year old tree: silent, attentive and indifferent to human haste.