Braunschlag

Awesome series from Austria! Great acting/cast, well written & beautifully absurd drama & dark comedy mix.

The plot takes some bizarre turns, yet it stays reasonable... or, to be more precise, whatever might seem reasonable in such a small, set back town (village?!) like Braunschlag. And all the strange characters that happen to be part of the towns' community.

Since I am a native German speaker I can't tell if Braunschlag delivers the same good in a subtitled version. But if you've ever found yourself enjoying subtitled movies from, well, mid Europe, you should definitely give Braunschlag a try.

To be honest, at first, I could not get into this show. I am not the biggest fan of German or Austrian TV-shows, because normally, they are really boring (e.g. the "Tatort"). But after two, three episodes, I loved it. The strange relationship between the most people in this world full of sarcasm, murder, greed and lust. While the series is ongoing, it becomes stranger and stranger, until it explodes in an absurdity, that can reach even "Fargo". New story lines just com over the way, as if they were usual, when you didn't expect it, and within 8 episodes, David Schalko is creating us a masterpiece of TV history.

A series was rarely so close to Austria and its people. The story and idea of director and screenwriter David Schalko is as simple as it is effective. But that is not the point. Its about the people, the crazy characters, the dialect and the everyday problems of a small village at the end of the world.

The actors play their role with excellent credibility - above all Nicholas Ofczarek, whom I already knew from the series The Pass. As well as Robert Palfrader.

The story is mixed with scenes that are sometimes super exaggerated, some of which look like they are from a bad science fiction film. Perhaps the only scenes in which you notice that director and author David Schalko is a self taught artist. The second point of criticism may certainly be the weaker second half of the series, in which the tension partly flattens out completely and the story drags on for a long time. The big finale at the end makes up for a lot.

All in all a rarely, crazy, excellent drama comedy. Absolutely worthwhile and above all an absolute genre hit.