"Schönes Schlamassel" is a German/Austrian co-production from 2020, actually from September 2020, so a really new movie, but thatg of course does not say anything about its quality. The director is Austrian Wolfgang Murnberger and this may explain why Austria is a production country here. But the language is of course German and also without accent. Murnberger is also a writer here and I really cannot say anything too negative about him as he has some movies in his body of work that i liked quite a bit. Also he is extremely experienced as he started with filmmaking back in the mid 80s, so the time I as born. He will have his 60th birthday later this year, but probably it happened already as you will maybe read this review in 2021 or even later. His co-writer here is Bavarian Peter Probst, also quite experienced. So I must say I was baffled by how terrible literally everything about this film turned out to be. If I was a Jew, especially, I would be truly embarrassed how my folks is shown here. The actress you see on the pic here is Verena Altenberger, also Austrian, and she was really bad with her performance here. Certainly no lead material, even if the way the character was written did not help at all and probably nobody could have made this work convincingly. Then again she could have refused the offer to star in this film. Instead she did and is hitting all the wrong notes, especially when she goes over the top on several occasions. Her co-lead is Maxim Mehmet (equally bad), who sometimes reminds me a bit of Martin Freemman I think and this is not meant as a compliment because some could understand it this way, especially fans of the very overrated "Sherlock" where admmittedly Cumberbatch is a much bigger problem than Freeman, but now we are drifting away. Back to these 1.5 hours here. The biggest name from the cast is of course Didi Hallervorden, playing an elderly writer. I will talk a bit about his character later on. Oh yes, Lisa Wagner is in here too, Erni Mangold, Monika John, so the cast is probably above-average which shows Murnberger's reputation as well as how television is booming in Germany, sadly not quality-wise because casts were less specatacular 15 years ago or so.
Alright, now the story. The idea is that the female protagonist here only wants a Jewish friend and the moment she spots the chain on the love interest doctor, it is already a lost cause. There Altenberger is already really messing it up with her eyes and smile. Zero subtlety in her performance. Problem is the man of her choice is not actually Jewish, but only pretends to be in order to be with her. Okay? Okay. Very accurate that she does not care about his looks, about his profession, about his character, but only about his religion. Very tolerant too. I'm pretty sure that had this been about Christians, people would call them Nazis, and there was also no option that this could have been amous Muslims because it is indeed a very shallow approach. And yet we were supposed to find the woman likable? With all she does. And please don't tell me the ending where she still takes him as her partner (yep the woman decides) whenthe lie is out makes up for that and depicts her as tolerant. Honestly, the guy was just as unlikable if he wants to date somebody like that. Other than that, they are really getting in each and every single reference about Jewery: foreskins, traditional meals, the Holocaust, Jewish literature and so on. Extremely uninspired. All quantity over quality. As for the literature, this is where Hallervorden comes into play as he plays an elderly Jewish writer. But boy, has his story added absolutely nothing to this film. I am always a bit undecided on Didi, who is an icon here in Germany, but I think "Sein letztes Rennen" was a masterpiece, but in this film we have here he is so completely wasted. Just like the grumpy old lady who is always critical about everything, but also has tears of joy in her face about characters she barely knows by the way. makes a lot of sense. Yep, as always with these films, the forced happy ending is inevitable. But yeah, like I said, nothing about Hallervorden's character's story here really makes an impact. It only shows us the female protagonist with glasses, so we see her also as an intellectual while she is all up in arms about (alleged) discrimination. It is absolutely disgraceful. These are serious parts. Difficult to make them work and Altenberger goes full ham every time. Impossble to watch. By the way, on a completely different note, the word "Schlamassel" in the title sounds really Jewish too. That's why it is in there. impossible to translate and keep the Jewish reference, but it simply means "Big mess". Okay, one more thing you frequently see being done wrong in these films is that the characters are explaining something to the audience that they shouldn't. here this applies to Mehmet on one occasion for example when he says he cooked something and adds that it is a top Jewish traditional dish. He says that to a woman who knows almost everything about Jewery. Enough said. Oh yeah, I already said how she eventually takes him although she knows he is not Jewish. This goes against her (admmittedly really stupid) plan to only date Jews, so they are basically giving the middle finger here to literally everything they showed us before. Only for the stupid happy ending. Finally, another subplot here is about the male protagonist's buddy, who ends up in a relationship with Wagner's character. And that was so cringeworthy too. I am not only talking about the sex scenes there. More garbage writing all along and I am pretty disappointed by Wagner she agreed to take the part because I have seen her series where she plays a cop and it is not all bad, but her role and performance in this movie are utter trash. Plus I find her deep voice a bit irritating. She should get a voice coach. Okay, that is all I have to say about this film i think. Too much already, even if I know it would be very easy to mention another dozen scenes, for example the gynecologist jokes (one especially embarrassing by Wagner's character) that are simply as unfunny as everything else about this film. Such as the idea that ex-partners turn gay, something that happens so often in this kind of movies, what the heck? It's not funny, it's not smart, it's not realistic. Just dumb. I think the good news is that Ziegler and Degeto film productions that are both almost always very horrible are not as frequent anymore as they were between 2005 and 2015, but as long as films like this are being made and even shown during prime time, there is no acceptable solution. This is a terrible, terrible film sending out all the wrong messages. I highly recommend you to stay far far away from it. The bad news is that it will probably still be on afternoon television until 2035 or so. Your GEZ money at work, folks. Stand up.
Alright, now the story. The idea is that the female protagonist here only wants a Jewish friend and the moment she spots the chain on the love interest doctor, it is already a lost cause. There Altenberger is already really messing it up with her eyes and smile. Zero subtlety in her performance. Problem is the man of her choice is not actually Jewish, but only pretends to be in order to be with her. Okay? Okay. Very accurate that she does not care about his looks, about his profession, about his character, but only about his religion. Very tolerant too. I'm pretty sure that had this been about Christians, people would call them Nazis, and there was also no option that this could have been amous Muslims because it is indeed a very shallow approach. And yet we were supposed to find the woman likable? With all she does. And please don't tell me the ending where she still takes him as her partner (yep the woman decides) whenthe lie is out makes up for that and depicts her as tolerant. Honestly, the guy was just as unlikable if he wants to date somebody like that. Other than that, they are really getting in each and every single reference about Jewery: foreskins, traditional meals, the Holocaust, Jewish literature and so on. Extremely uninspired. All quantity over quality. As for the literature, this is where Hallervorden comes into play as he plays an elderly Jewish writer. But boy, has his story added absolutely nothing to this film. I am always a bit undecided on Didi, who is an icon here in Germany, but I think "Sein letztes Rennen" was a masterpiece, but in this film we have here he is so completely wasted. Just like the grumpy old lady who is always critical about everything, but also has tears of joy in her face about characters she barely knows by the way. makes a lot of sense. Yep, as always with these films, the forced happy ending is inevitable. But yeah, like I said, nothing about Hallervorden's character's story here really makes an impact. It only shows us the female protagonist with glasses, so we see her also as an intellectual while she is all up in arms about (alleged) discrimination. It is absolutely disgraceful. These are serious parts. Difficult to make them work and Altenberger goes full ham every time. Impossble to watch. By the way, on a completely different note, the word "Schlamassel" in the title sounds really Jewish too. That's why it is in there. impossible to translate and keep the Jewish reference, but it simply means "Big mess". Okay, one more thing you frequently see being done wrong in these films is that the characters are explaining something to the audience that they shouldn't. here this applies to Mehmet on one occasion for example when he says he cooked something and adds that it is a top Jewish traditional dish. He says that to a woman who knows almost everything about Jewery. Enough said. Oh yeah, I already said how she eventually takes him although she knows he is not Jewish. This goes against her (admmittedly really stupid) plan to only date Jews, so they are basically giving the middle finger here to literally everything they showed us before. Only for the stupid happy ending. Finally, another subplot here is about the male protagonist's buddy, who ends up in a relationship with Wagner's character. And that was so cringeworthy too. I am not only talking about the sex scenes there. More garbage writing all along and I am pretty disappointed by Wagner she agreed to take the part because I have seen her series where she plays a cop and it is not all bad, but her role and performance in this movie are utter trash. Plus I find her deep voice a bit irritating. She should get a voice coach. Okay, that is all I have to say about this film i think. Too much already, even if I know it would be very easy to mention another dozen scenes, for example the gynecologist jokes (one especially embarrassing by Wagner's character) that are simply as unfunny as everything else about this film. Such as the idea that ex-partners turn gay, something that happens so often in this kind of movies, what the heck? It's not funny, it's not smart, it's not realistic. Just dumb. I think the good news is that Ziegler and Degeto film productions that are both almost always very horrible are not as frequent anymore as they were between 2005 and 2015, but as long as films like this are being made and even shown during prime time, there is no acceptable solution. This is a terrible, terrible film sending out all the wrong messages. I highly recommend you to stay far far away from it. The bad news is that it will probably still be on afternoon television until 2035 or so. Your GEZ money at work, folks. Stand up.
