prospero22

This epic documentary/drama about arguably the greatest German author of the 20th century is really fascinating. Watching Elisabeth Mann-Borgese return to the places of her childhood is quite a moving experience and you feel the wisdom and the experience this old lady can share with the world. And it is a great gift for all of us that she did so shortly before her death. What a great family story this is! Everybody does a tremendous job in acting their roles (well, apart from Veronica Ferres' Nelly Kröger, whom I don't hold as such a good actress; especially her faked Northern German accent didn't convince me), and I fear I'll have difficulties not seeing the face of Armin Mueller-Stahl before me whenever I'll think of Thomas Mann in the future. This mixture of historical movie and documentary is just about perfect and may establish a new genre.

I don't really know what's the hype about this movie. It's a nice little coming-out movie, but not better than most others of this genre. OK, apparently there hasn't been a German one that was intended for a big audience, but I'm not sure about that. I'm gay and maybe that's why I'm surprised about the fact that a movie with a perfectly normal gay main character is still stared at as if it came from another planet in this country. Anyway, Stadlober does a fine acting job in the film, but I couldn't help feeling I was watching a remake of his earlier "Crazy", a very similar "Coming of age"-movie which presents a "different" (in this case physically disabled) main character. Maybe coming to terms with your own homosexuality makes some people blind to the plight of others, but watching Tobi (Stadlober) treat Anke (Alicja Bachleda-Curus) like dirt [didn't want to use the other word;] did not make him very sympathetic to me. Very aesthetic lighting and nice music. Makes it look a little like a stylish commercial sometimes, though. Oh yes, Saxonian is an accent that was not yet made fun of in a movie yet, I guess. That's a (questionable?) innovation... I'm probably wrong about that anyway.