cloudyskye

The one thing I found very unrealistic was the successful doctor's rather conventional parents not batting an eyelid at his chosen bride being the single mother of someone else's child. It's the early 60s, mind.

Other than that, I rather liked it, good actors and a decent story all around. Helmut Schmidt - German Chancellor from 1974 to 1982, beautifully played by Christian Berkel - as the Hamburg senator running the rescue show in his well-known pragmatic and resolute way was my favourite storyline.

Ever since I discovered this, I watch it every Christmas. I mean, the story couldn't BE more cheesy and Christine Neubauer couldn't BE a worse actress.

Most of the others are actually quite decent, my favourite being Floriane Daniel as Laura's best friend (and the only real Berlinerin in this effort). I almost wish Sebastian had fallen in love with her - instead of that younger copy of his sweet elderly scheming mother. Uncanny how those two look just like each other ...

Still, to me the real superstar here is the city of Salzburg. Watch this if you can't visit Salzburg in person - and if your Sound of Music DVD is broken!!! ;)

I had to watch this with my young nieces, and honestly, it made me sick. Cliché-ridden doesn't even begin to describe this drivel. I had never seen anything with Emma Roberts before and after this certainly never will. OK, as a rule it's a hard act for Americans to compete with English actors, remember colourless Andie McDowell in „Four weddings". E. R. may be talented, well, I doubt it. She shows just one facial expression, to distract from which fact she is flashing about her skinny white legs and freakishly pointy knees. She looks totally bland and forgettable, especially in that horribly obvious blond wig in the first half, in no way prettier than her English counterparts. And since when is being a Californian particularly exotic? But the story's pretty boy falls for her almost at once, oh yeah. She doesn't even have to play hard to get, au contraire. Actually not even a better actress, say a young Jennifer Aniston, could have saved this horrible story. There is the obligatory dressing up scene – Roberts's aunt had a legendary one in "Pretty Woman", but whereas erstwhile prostitute Julia/Vivien emerged as an elegant lady, Emma/Poppy goes from spoilt brat in super-high heels to pole dancer-prostitute look-and-act-alike. I shudder when I think of the age group this is aimed at. Awful, awful, awful!