"Alles Samba" (I guess they picked this title because it is easy to memorize, but it is really not what this film is about at all at its core) is a German television film from 2003, so this one is already over 15 years old. Maybe you guessed correctly already from the photo that this is one for the holidays. The director and co-writer is Bernd Böhlich, who has been making films for a long time and also has had successes in his career that usually make him better than the average director of films like this. The lead actress here is played by Gudrun Landgrebe, who was a pretty big star during her peak, but now she isn't really known to too many anymore I believe, especially among the younger generation. In this film she plays a successful businesswoman who donates money regularly to a little girl from Brazil (played by Mußul who is still a prolific actress today, but it is really unrealistic how well her character's German is in here and the only explanation they give us is that it is her favorite subject?) to pay for her education, but things change in a way that the girl ends up in Germany and they try to get Landgrebe's character to take care of the little one. That did feel a bit absurd already I must admit, but it is alright I guess. Just for the key plot theme really, they could have done slightly better. One of the aspects I enjoyed more about this movie was the reference to snow and how they faked it for the girl to be happy, but also how as the climax near the end there was real snow falling down, which was pretty nice. By the way, I definitely must mention too that Ulrich Mühe is in this film as well, even if he does not have that much screen time. Still one of the bigger supporting players and this film came out 3 years before "The Lives of Others", which also means not too long ago before his untimely death. So you see that big-name actors here in Germany also frequently star in TV movies. Until this day actually.
The biggest male character, i.e. the one with the most screen time, here is played by Günther Maria Halmer, who in my opinion really looked a lot like Depardieu here. But maybe that is just me. Anyway, he plays the guy who is the link between the two female protagonists, but of course eventually he becomes more than that and there are signs that he could end up in a romantic relationship with Landgrebe's. I think it would have been a bit of a cheesy plot twist, but they kept it vague enough for me not have a negative impact too much, so it is alright. Still, the aspects I did not like overall were more frequent than the ones I enjoyed. Like when the girl continues to leave her marks on this important painting, that is a bit cringeworthy honestly also with the moment when she gets hit. Or when Landgrebe's character realizes she made a mistake, then she goes to see them and Halmer's character says something like she is not eating anymore, drinking anymore, and most importantly not dancing anymore. Come on. You can do better dialogue writing than that. And before that, way before actually, there is that scene when the central character goes and meets Halmer's character and tells him that he has to take the girl with him again and at that moment it also did not feel very credible to me because that was already after the fake snow scene that clearly showed us to what lengths Landgrebe's character would go for the little one and it just did not feel very believable that nonetheless she is just ready to leave her behind from one moment to the next. So yeah, I guess it is better than many other German (Christmas) television films, but that does not mean, it is a good watch. By general standards, I still give this one here a thumbs-down and overall I also feel Mühe's screen time and impact (of course he gets his own pink fluffy minor romance story line) are too minimal, so I would not even recommend it to Mühe fans just for him. Because I am one of the latter too and it simply isn't enough. Watch something else instead.
The biggest male character, i.e. the one with the most screen time, here is played by Günther Maria Halmer, who in my opinion really looked a lot like Depardieu here. But maybe that is just me. Anyway, he plays the guy who is the link between the two female protagonists, but of course eventually he becomes more than that and there are signs that he could end up in a romantic relationship with Landgrebe's. I think it would have been a bit of a cheesy plot twist, but they kept it vague enough for me not have a negative impact too much, so it is alright. Still, the aspects I did not like overall were more frequent than the ones I enjoyed. Like when the girl continues to leave her marks on this important painting, that is a bit cringeworthy honestly also with the moment when she gets hit. Or when Landgrebe's character realizes she made a mistake, then she goes to see them and Halmer's character says something like she is not eating anymore, drinking anymore, and most importantly not dancing anymore. Come on. You can do better dialogue writing than that. And before that, way before actually, there is that scene when the central character goes and meets Halmer's character and tells him that he has to take the girl with him again and at that moment it also did not feel very credible to me because that was already after the fake snow scene that clearly showed us to what lengths Landgrebe's character would go for the little one and it just did not feel very believable that nonetheless she is just ready to leave her behind from one moment to the next. So yeah, I guess it is better than many other German (Christmas) television films, but that does not mean, it is a good watch. By general standards, I still give this one here a thumbs-down and overall I also feel Mühe's screen time and impact (of course he gets his own pink fluffy minor romance story line) are too minimal, so I would not even recommend it to Mühe fans just for him. Because I am one of the latter too and it simply isn't enough. Watch something else instead.