I have just watched this German crime movie based upon a Charlotte Link novel and this film exemplifies everything that is wrong with the mass production of German crime movies nowadays that are flooding numerous television channels and over-saturating the market.
First of all, this crime movie has the exact same type of atmosphere as the majority of German crime flicks these days. This film is very depressive, numb and slow. The sky is grey and the sun never shines. The chosen settings consist of abandoned ports, old buildings and ugly streets in shabby suburbs. The characters look unhappy and never smile.
This film also includes the usual dose of social criticism. The problem of German script writers is that they always try to add a moral to their stories instead of focusing on an entertaining story. This film mostly criticizes ruthless journalists and brutal pimps. Instead of adding a thought-provoking element, this type of social criticism artificially stretches this film, slows down its pace and feels very repetitive and stereotypical. That being said, there are already countless movies criticizing journalism and prostitution which proves that the makers of this film are running out of ideas and delivering a pale routine job.
This would be pardonable if the story were only interesting. Sadly, the story isn't interesting at all and highly predictable. Pretty much everything I was expecting to happen actually happened in the end. The plot is really a typical German crime flick by the numbers.
The acting is the only aspect that isn't abysmal but it isn't great either. The actors and actresses are busy looking sad, taking a considerable time to finish most of their sentences and are slowly walking around as if they were sleepwalking. The acting is everything but enthusiastic but since that was the filmmakers' intention, one must admit that the actresses and actors fit perfectly to the depressive atmosphere of this movie.
It's beyond me why German producers are unable and unwilling to produce a crime flick with a positive and vivid vibe, or a thriller with some humorous elements, or a suspenseful flick with some gripping action sequences. The only thing German producers are able to offer these days are slow-paced crime flicks with repetitive story lines and some melodramatic social criticism in suicidal grey settings. If they can't find any stories of that kind among German authors and script writers, producers decide to invest in foreign authors and script writers with a very similar style as in this case. German crime flicks and television series need a revolutionary revamp. Get rid of the conservative, depressive and moralistic stereotypes and try out something new. Let German television be creative, emotional and energizing again.
