User Reviews

"Happy Birthday, Türke!" or also "Happy Birthday!" is a German movie from 1992, so it has its 25th anniversary this year and it runs for 105 minutes approximately. The film is based on a novel by a far too early deceased writer and Doris Dörrie was in charge of the script and director she is of course as well. And the fact that this is nowhere near her earliest works makes obvious how long shhe is already in the business. I quite like some of her stuff and really dislike some other, but this one here is certainly among her better effort. The crime story is solid even without an outstanding performance by lead actor Hansa Czypionka. He works as a private eye and a Turkish woman comes to his office and tells him a story about her man disappearing the very same day her dad died in an accident. A great deal of mystery here. The way the story unfolds and our "hero" gets sucked in deeper and deeper into the abyss of crime and corruption that also involves lawyers and police officers. The supporting characters are fine too. Some add dramatic relevance, while others are mostly there for comic relief that keep the film from becoming too seriously eventually. Yet there are a lot of crime, violence, drama and thriller events in here. This is nowhere near to a comedy. I kinda liked the constant references about the protagonist's lack of Turkish characteristics at all, his background, his language, his methods and still everybody sees him as a Turk, refers to his Turkish heritage etc. The one scene when we hear a woman say how well he speaks German and his reaction were fairly hilarious. The cast is a mix of German and Turkish actors and some of the Germans are still fairly known today like Król, Petri and Becker, even if they were maybe more famous back then than they are today. In any case, German film buffs will see some familiar faces here during the early stages of their career. Overall, I would say that maybe 5, maybe even 10 minutes of insignificant scenes, could have been cut out and in a best case scenario they even would have fixed some of the moments that did not feel entirely realistic. But despite these, it was a gritty film noir on many occasions. The main character is not a super hero or anything, but a dedicated investigator who may have his own demons that he keeps fighting. Bad guys, sweet temptations, it is all in here. I can see why Czypionka received some awards attention for his turn. His portrayal of dedication mixed with imperfection works out well as a whole, but it really has to as we see everything from his perspective and he is basically in the film from to finish with no interruption. We always know what he knows. And I know that I give this one a thumbs-up. Not a perfect film, but one that deserves to be seen. Maybe Dörrie should have made more crome movies judging from this one.

I've seen the film for the first time on DVD. First of all, it had a very poor technical quality on DVD, the yellow seemed faded, leaving over-strong blue and red images. I don't know if this is a technical mistake or if the movie was planned that way. At any rate, it felt old and amateurish because of that. My main problem was the story, though. I haven't read the novel, so I don't know how much is due to it. But even then, I would have expected from a filmmaker the range of Doris Dörrie to apply some well-known techniques to raise suspense and build character. But she didn't. Most of the dialogue was weak, referring only to the situation at hand. A considerable flaw is the fact that we see everything from the point of view of the protagonist - he leaves the room, we leave with him, not knowing what the person inside does next. It would have created more suspense, I believe, if the audience would have learned more about all the characters. Then, maybe we'd also have cared more about the murdered men and their family. The protagonist himself seems not to care too much about other persons - at the very beginning, a woman leaves him on his birthday; he never comments on that, neither showing regrets or maybe even happiness to be rid of her. His own sad family history is repeated several times, but never in a way that would give us insight into his character. The Turkish family seems an odd construction, made only for the sake of the criminal case. The rendering of the policemen is uninteresting, it isn't in the least shocking to see that they're the real criminals. One would think that, having managed to kill so many people, they wouldn't leave this snoop alive. Did we learn anything about Turkish life in Germany? Nope. Only clichés about how insensitive the Germans are. The only reason I give more than one point is Meret Becker, here being seen at the beginning of her career, playing a young woman with genuine despair and tenderness. There are more good actors in the film, but they don't get the chance to display their talent.