Review of How to Be Really Bad

I cannot deny that I was not impressed at all by the success of some of Marco Petry's most known works in the last 20 years, most of all the very overrated "Schule", but with "Meine teuflisch gute Freundin" he kinda won me over. This may not necessarily have to do with his writing and directing only because the film is based on a novel and I am writing this review as somebody who has not read said novel, but it it's close to the original material, then that says a lot of positive things about the book. There is a bit of fantasy Sci-Fi note attached to the film as here we have the daughter of the devil coming to Earth where she is supposed to turn the most caring and harmless girl into someone evil. Without the use of magic, that is. Initially, I was not too big on the actress playing the main character, but the longer the film went, the more she grew on me. The one I loved right from the start, not just physically, was Janina Fautz who did really fine here and I am curious to see her in upcoming projects. I kept wonderwing what it was with these Jewish almost Anne-Frank-like looks and also the name of her character, but maybe it was just coincidence, this is really not what the film is about. instead, it is about love, friendship and lots of fun from start to finish. These sweaters from Greta's mother were the coolest thing ever and it's hilarious that on one occasion we see these two trendy girls wearing them too. By the way these and everything else about Great reminded me a bit if Jamie in "A Walk to Remember". But maybe that's just me because I really adore that character and movie. I already mentioned the two trendsetter girls who always had the perfect style and these were also one reason why I liked the film, they were not depicted as black-and-white 100% antagonists, but actually somewhat likable despite their superficial behavior at times. And eventually, they become good friends with Greta. Or the story about the womanizer boyfriend who just may not have found the right girl to turn him into a good guy and that he is not used for story purposes as somebody who disappoints every girl he is with and this an antagonist. The only thing close to an adversary is the guy who gets burned in a funny manner early on and even he is more in it for the comedy. oh yeah and the principal too. Maybe that embezzlement reference is a bit too much at the very end to be fair. It's strange to see how Axel Stein looks like these days, especially given how he looked like in petry's works almost 20 years ago, but good for him I guess. The character wasn't bad, but admittedly added very little to be fair. So for the film itself, it is another pretty decent German teenager films. These have been becoming a bit less in recent years, but maybe this one can bring the genre back on track. It would be nice to see something like this in animation too here in Germany. Overall, maybe not a must-see really, but very entertaining 100 minutes I'd say that can be seen not just by the young ones who have the same age like the main characters, but also by those considerably older and young at heart. I as somebody twice the age of the key people in here enjoyed it way more than I expected. It's also a pretty smart film one must say and one that never takes itself more seriously than it should, which is nothing you should be taking for granted when it comes to German movies (*cough* Schweighöfer *cough*) So yeah, see it if you like the genre. You will not be disappointed.