Muttertag

In a housing estate in Vienna everyone prepares for the first Sunday in May. Everybody knows everybody, and everybody knows everybody's dirty little secrets. A boy prepares an electronic knife for his mother to cut herself in the stomach, the grandfather donates all the familiy's money to the WWF and the father's sidestep comes to light.

Beside the film "Indien" "Muttertag" is an Austrian cult-film. Hopefully "Muttertag" will not be synchronized for Germany like they did with "Indien".....(perhaps subtitles would do :))) )

The dramatic last act of this film is - by actors, camera und script - even better than the breakdown of Michael Douglas in Falling Down. The concept of using each actor for a couple of characters makes this film even a hide-and-seek-game for the audience. Visiting the original places in vienna (or similar elsewhere) makes you sure, that most of the story ist real, though its satyrical.

Most Austrian contemporary movies are bad. Austria is famous for classical music and gave the world important modern painters, even Actionism artists, but most of its movies made after the Second World War are forgettable, especially comedies. (The serious movies are all depressing.)

Muttertag is an extremely low-level type of "humor", similar to cheap Italian comedies, only much worse. Every single character and situation is the cheapest possible overdrawn caricature. If your taste is intelligent, witty comedy, you'll hate Muttertag, unless you are 13 years old. It's the type of comedy Austrians are used to, so it's no surprise they adore this movie. Hence, the high ratings.

PS: I live in Austria.

After just watching "Muttertag" again for the first time in years I am stunned by how great it really is. Almost every line of dialog has become a classic catchphrase. You know the movie by heart, because it's getting quoted all the time in Austria - and rightly so! "Muttertag" is not just hilariously absurd, it's also an accurate portrayal of the people living in Vienna's suburbs with all their typical quirks.

Alfred Dorfer, Andreas Nowak, Roland Düringer, Eva Billisich and Andrea Händler play various roles and they all play them to perfection. Düringer and Dorfer, of course, went on to become the most popular Austrian comedians, starred in a lot of other movies and even managed to put a successful sitcom on Austrian television. However, they never achieved the greatness of this movie again and no other Austrian comedy ever did.

"Muttertag" is really a fluke. It has influenced a whole generation and will always remain a classic. Can someone in Austria please make another movie as original and funny as this one?

If you don't know the place where this film is set, if you don't know the people you might not understand or like it. Almost every line of this movie is legendary, brilliant performances by Düringer and Dorfer each one playing multiple characters.