Berlin Syndrome

Underrated film. Starts slow but elevates the tension as it goes along. A solid unsettling thriller. Hopefully it won't put u off backpacking but it is a good film and will make u think of your choices not to trust everyone.

Australian Clare Havel (Teresa Palmer) is backpacking in Berlin. She meets a local named Andi and goes home with him. Next morning, she tries to leave after he left for work but finds that she's locked in.

A normal beautiful-woman-getting-kidnapped movie usually involves a violent shove into a murder van. The interesting change in this movie is that Clare willingly walks into her cage. It's a Venus flytrap. The moment of realization is great. I love the camera pushing in on the locked door. I would delay smashing the window. On the negative side, I don't think I care about the guy and his life. He's not original enough. This is a slow creepy movie.

Wow! This film really builds up the tension. I don't want to say much about the third act, except that I think it was good. I particularly enjoyed the sound design in this film, and how it added so much to the suspense and mystery. I wasn't immediately sold on the actors, but they sort of grew on me. They certainly played their roles well, I just felt like maybe they were lacking a bit of emotional range or chemistry with each other. It didn't detract from what is a truly excellent horror film of its genre. It is brutal, genuinely scary, haunting. You truly feel the hopelessness and anguish of the female character. The sheer dread of her situation. You wonder how you would behave if you found yourself in that same scenario. That's what good horror is all about.

So what we have here, is Fifty Shades of Stockholm Syndrome (Google it if you're unsure what that is, the film will make more sense knowing the definition).

Right off the top, waaaay too slowly paced. I get it, it needed to be a little slow, but not 2 hours (that felt like 3) of slow. Had I watched this film at least 1.25x faster speed, and edited properly, it would have been more enjoyable, and shorter.

The directing was OK, the writing needed tweaking (e.g. the ending was too stale for all that tension that was built up) but the cinematography was on point.

The best part of this film was Teresa Palmer in her role... she aced it. Very convincing and played her emotional roller-coaster well. Max Riemelt was stale and I felt his role should have been cast better or he shouldn't have been as 'flat' as he was. The director needed to direct his role better as he was unconvincing.

The screenplay (combined in part with the score) was the only other positive attribute of this film. The tension was constant, and just when you relaxed, it got built up again.

There were however many plot holes - specifically the amount of defensive weapons available for escaping, such as the heavy pots on the stove, glass from any of the two broken windows that she could have hid pieces and slit his throat while he was sleeping etc... and unnecessary sub-plots (e.g. his dad, the parts when other women touched him and he portrayed a germaphobe).

A few ill-informed reviewers stated it was an independent film, of which it was not. Having production companies left right and center backing it such as: Aquarius Films, DDP Studios, Entertainment One, Film Victoria, Fulcrum Media Finance, Memento Films International, Photoplay Film, Screen Australia, and distributed by Entertainment One, Curzon Artificial Eye, Vertical Entertainment and Netflix... it's clearly not an independent film. For a B-type film with that type of backing, it needed to be much better in my opinion.

So rating it as a B-type film, it's a generous 6/10 from me.

This film tells the story of an Australian tourist, who meets a charming German man while she is backpacking in Berlin. A night of passion then leads to months of nightmare, as she is locked up in his fortified home.

I have not heard of the film "Berlin Syndrome" before, so I was pleasantly surprised by how well made it was. The story is realistic, convincing and very very disturbing. The thing is that, it could really happen to anyone in every day life. How would you know your new friend is not a psycho? The man in the film is so sick and perverted, that words just cannot describe it. This fear and uncertainty translates to real life easily, which makes the film very engaging and unnerving. The thrill of the film is very well portrayed and maintained. I find myself hoping for the best, but mentally prepared for the worst. It is a surprisingly thrilling film, and I would definitely recommend it to other people.