"Kompanie der Knallköppe" is a West German live action film from the year 1971, so this one is already over 50 years old now, which sadly means that many of the cast members are not alive anymore, but as several actors were really young when this got made, they are still with us in their 70s now. This film that runs for over 95 minutes also goes by the almost identical title "Kompanie der Knallköpfe" or the pretty different title "Drei blaue Jungs in Oberbayern", which means "three blue boys in upper Bavaria", even if "blue" could also mean "drunk" in this context, but I kinda doubt it because there are not alcohol excesses in this film really. What it surely does not mean is "blue" in the sense of "sad". Nobody is sad in this movie. The original title includes the German word "Kompanie" which is a term for a group from a military camp and thus far more specific compared to the English term "company". And the last word in the original title basically just means "fools". The names Momme and Kahlfuß are quite fitting there. These do not exude competence. So much for the language aspect here. The writer and director was Rolf Olsen, around the age of 50 when he shot this movie, so obviously not with us anymore, but he was a prolific actor himself, even if he was the man in charge behind the camera. He worked on many projects throughout his career, also as a writer and director, but the fact that this one here is maybe among his most known tells us that his efforts are mostly forgotten, even if there were so many. Judging from the quality in this movie, I cannot be sad about it really.
If you are familiar with the German school prankster films that got made in German in the late 1960s and early 1970s and featured the character of Pepe Nietnagel, then you will not only recognize Hansi Kraus here, but also Ilja Richter, the beautiful Mascha Gonska and of course Rudolf Schündler who were among the defining names from the Nietnagel franchise back then. With the exception of Schündler, probably my favorite from the bunch, they are also still with us all three of them. And so is Christiane Rücker. They were all around the age of 20 back then, so nice to see they are still alive anymore. However, I cannot say anything positive really about Ilja Richter, who is probably the most active these days from all those, still playing stage theater on a regular basis and getting interviewed from time to time. However, I just cannot take him seriously as an actor, maybe also because in his recent outings he clearly wants to be taken seriously. The thing he does is go over the top in all his (old) movies. Maybe he has more charisma than most others, but in terms of range and musical talent as well, I do not see anything in him at all. This film cannot change my perception. I mean the moment he stood there in front of the plane after this massive flight and was really unstable physically was his role (or roles in general) in a nutshell. Showy yes, maybe here and there even mildly entertaining, but beyond klamauk there seems to be nothing to him. Also in other stuff I watched him in and it's been quite a few films actually. I hope you understand the word klamauk. I like it. It is fairly self-explanatory. One actor I have not yet mentioned is Eddi Arent, who even got first credit. For him this film here is surely not among his most known nowadays as he played in several Karl May Winnetou films and also in numerous Edgar Wallace adaptations, so also more serious material there in his body of work.
The film starts with his character and Richter's being salespeople ringing bells and trying to get people to pay for hoovers. Eventually, they enter a woman's apartment and the display process there goes all kinds of wrong and the apartment is a mess afterwards and the man living with the woman there is not happy at all. It is pretty difficult to really talk about a plot and continuity here, because it is all so over the place. In any case, the unlucky and incompetent duo ends up somehow in a scenario where they are mistaken for two important military men, a father and son and thins get even messier when we have the actual son show up, played by Roger Fritz, and he knows of course that the two are impostors and gets them (or rather one of them) to pilot a plane, because the man he is impersonating is a talented pilot. This is what resulted in the plane moment I mentioned earlier. Of course, if it is not the biggest coincidence already that the part essential for flying is replaced so the plane actually takes of, nothing can top the fact that the Arent's character there actually manages to fly the plane and come up with some loopings despite not having a clue what he is doing. I have to admit Richter's comment there that, right before they take off, his "father" must not press any buttons, was on the funny side. Here and there, I had to smile watching this movie. One quote from the romance story was nice too, like when a guy kisses a girl and she is a bit upset and he tells her that she can have her kiss back anytime, was actually a bit witty and the funniest comedy moment for me was surely early on when we have a military man talk to one of his cadets or so about something that is not in order and the cadet responds that it was the military man himself who made that choice a while ago. That was fine situational comedy.
However, for every solid moment here, there are three not so solid moments, like take the scene in which one male character saves a female character after the horses had gone wild. That was so scripted and out of nowhere really. This one romance story also would have been enough, but they included another surrounding Kraus' character and of course there is a happy ending to both of them. This was also very strange, as if something was missing. There were those arguments and both relationships seemed troublesome and then at the end they stand there with their partners and everybody is happy. Talk about a forced happy ending. And things do not look differently on the impostor front. It all comes out, but nobody is mad at all. After people before that stated that others will do terrible things with them if it all comes out. Not even Schündler could save it for me when he shows up at the very end then. And the film ended not only with a bang that he showed up, but an actual bang. I guess the proper physical reaction to an explosion is people losing their pants? At least this is what they did in this movie. All this made no sense, but I guess you can say the same about many German films from this era back then. It was not exactly the most glorious time for German cinema, the 1960s at least. In the 70s then things got a little bit better. However, I must also say that it is not a disastrous movie from beginning to end we have here. I could imagine that the performers had some fun shooting it and it was not fake. Here and there, the joy felt almost a bit contagious. Unfortunately, in other segments the line deliveries of the already awful dialogues was rock-bottom material. Nobody could have saved this script, not even the best Hollywood actors from back in the day. Not that they would have wanted to get anywhere near this production.
I watched this film on German television today or rather on the internet presence of a German television broadcaster that focuses on music and music films in the German language. But yeah, I watched it online because nobody is really having this channel available on their TV. Still, you have to give them a thumbs-up for coming with such an online presence. Not to be taken for granted, no matter how poor most of the content is that they are showing. Apart from the three times maybe this film is played each year on said channel, it is almost impossible to find it elsewhere despite some of the familiar names and faces. Probably a good thing because you won't be missing much if you skip the watch and seeing it once is already one time too many. I am also still unsure why the alternate title here includes three men. I guess Fritz's character has to be third or Kraus' perhaps, but his role turned out smaller than they had on their minds initially. If you wanna see him in a more defining role with way more screen time, this one here is not the film to choose. But you will not find it anywhere anyway, so all is good. I give the outcome here a thumbs-down, which was really never in doubt. It should have been much funnier for a positive recommendation. I mean I like cringeworthy word play, but don't get me started on A. R. SCH in this film. Admittedly, inclusions like the greeting reference were funnier, but all in all I have to say that it is best if you watch something else instead.
If you are familiar with the German school prankster films that got made in German in the late 1960s and early 1970s and featured the character of Pepe Nietnagel, then you will not only recognize Hansi Kraus here, but also Ilja Richter, the beautiful Mascha Gonska and of course Rudolf Schündler who were among the defining names from the Nietnagel franchise back then. With the exception of Schündler, probably my favorite from the bunch, they are also still with us all three of them. And so is Christiane Rücker. They were all around the age of 20 back then, so nice to see they are still alive anymore. However, I cannot say anything positive really about Ilja Richter, who is probably the most active these days from all those, still playing stage theater on a regular basis and getting interviewed from time to time. However, I just cannot take him seriously as an actor, maybe also because in his recent outings he clearly wants to be taken seriously. The thing he does is go over the top in all his (old) movies. Maybe he has more charisma than most others, but in terms of range and musical talent as well, I do not see anything in him at all. This film cannot change my perception. I mean the moment he stood there in front of the plane after this massive flight and was really unstable physically was his role (or roles in general) in a nutshell. Showy yes, maybe here and there even mildly entertaining, but beyond klamauk there seems to be nothing to him. Also in other stuff I watched him in and it's been quite a few films actually. I hope you understand the word klamauk. I like it. It is fairly self-explanatory. One actor I have not yet mentioned is Eddi Arent, who even got first credit. For him this film here is surely not among his most known nowadays as he played in several Karl May Winnetou films and also in numerous Edgar Wallace adaptations, so also more serious material there in his body of work.
The film starts with his character and Richter's being salespeople ringing bells and trying to get people to pay for hoovers. Eventually, they enter a woman's apartment and the display process there goes all kinds of wrong and the apartment is a mess afterwards and the man living with the woman there is not happy at all. It is pretty difficult to really talk about a plot and continuity here, because it is all so over the place. In any case, the unlucky and incompetent duo ends up somehow in a scenario where they are mistaken for two important military men, a father and son and thins get even messier when we have the actual son show up, played by Roger Fritz, and he knows of course that the two are impostors and gets them (or rather one of them) to pilot a plane, because the man he is impersonating is a talented pilot. This is what resulted in the plane moment I mentioned earlier. Of course, if it is not the biggest coincidence already that the part essential for flying is replaced so the plane actually takes of, nothing can top the fact that the Arent's character there actually manages to fly the plane and come up with some loopings despite not having a clue what he is doing. I have to admit Richter's comment there that, right before they take off, his "father" must not press any buttons, was on the funny side. Here and there, I had to smile watching this movie. One quote from the romance story was nice too, like when a guy kisses a girl and she is a bit upset and he tells her that she can have her kiss back anytime, was actually a bit witty and the funniest comedy moment for me was surely early on when we have a military man talk to one of his cadets or so about something that is not in order and the cadet responds that it was the military man himself who made that choice a while ago. That was fine situational comedy.
However, for every solid moment here, there are three not so solid moments, like take the scene in which one male character saves a female character after the horses had gone wild. That was so scripted and out of nowhere really. This one romance story also would have been enough, but they included another surrounding Kraus' character and of course there is a happy ending to both of them. This was also very strange, as if something was missing. There were those arguments and both relationships seemed troublesome and then at the end they stand there with their partners and everybody is happy. Talk about a forced happy ending. And things do not look differently on the impostor front. It all comes out, but nobody is mad at all. After people before that stated that others will do terrible things with them if it all comes out. Not even Schündler could save it for me when he shows up at the very end then. And the film ended not only with a bang that he showed up, but an actual bang. I guess the proper physical reaction to an explosion is people losing their pants? At least this is what they did in this movie. All this made no sense, but I guess you can say the same about many German films from this era back then. It was not exactly the most glorious time for German cinema, the 1960s at least. In the 70s then things got a little bit better. However, I must also say that it is not a disastrous movie from beginning to end we have here. I could imagine that the performers had some fun shooting it and it was not fake. Here and there, the joy felt almost a bit contagious. Unfortunately, in other segments the line deliveries of the already awful dialogues was rock-bottom material. Nobody could have saved this script, not even the best Hollywood actors from back in the day. Not that they would have wanted to get anywhere near this production.
I watched this film on German television today or rather on the internet presence of a German television broadcaster that focuses on music and music films in the German language. But yeah, I watched it online because nobody is really having this channel available on their TV. Still, you have to give them a thumbs-up for coming with such an online presence. Not to be taken for granted, no matter how poor most of the content is that they are showing. Apart from the three times maybe this film is played each year on said channel, it is almost impossible to find it elsewhere despite some of the familiar names and faces. Probably a good thing because you won't be missing much if you skip the watch and seeing it once is already one time too many. I am also still unsure why the alternate title here includes three men. I guess Fritz's character has to be third or Kraus' perhaps, but his role turned out smaller than they had on their minds initially. If you wanna see him in a more defining role with way more screen time, this one here is not the film to choose. But you will not find it anywhere anyway, so all is good. I give the outcome here a thumbs-down, which was really never in doubt. It should have been much funnier for a positive recommendation. I mean I like cringeworthy word play, but don't get me started on A. R. SCH in this film. Admittedly, inclusions like the greeting reference were funnier, but all in all I have to say that it is best if you watch something else instead.
