"Meine Mutter will ein Enkelkind", which means "My mother wants a grandchild", is a German television film from 2020, from spring this year in fact, so this one is not even half a year old. Maybe reading the title you realize already (if you know a bit about German television) that this is a recent installment to the "My mother..." franchise an,d to be more precise, this is the fourth so far within a relatively short period of time and the fifth is also already going to happen soon. These films are the epitome of fast watch television if you want to call it that, the video equivalent to fast food. No quality, no realism, no humor, nothing. And yet people watch them for some reason. I hope that with my review I can at least change that a bit and keep people from seeing these garbage films in the future. The lack of attention to detail is really painfully no matter where you look. Be it the cringeworthy poster here on imdb that is in fact not even from this movie, but from one of the older ones or be it the fact that actual talk about and desire to have a grandchild is barely a factor in this film here. They just use the general basic ingredients. Marriage before that (as you can see from the photo), now kids. Actually, I would not be surprised if the female protagonist gets pregnant indeed in the next film or the one after that. Yes, I am worried they will keep making many more of these. However, as bad as this title may be, the working title or alternate title is really not any better: "Meine Mutter macht mich fertig" means "My mother is driving me nuts", and the title could not be more general than that really saying nothing about the film other than a troubled mother-daughter relationship is a part here, which also would not even be true because the two are getting along well when they have screen time together. Which isn't even often. Anyway, let's take another look at the basics here. the director is Jurij Neumann and the screenplay is by Christian Pfannenschmidt. I cannot really say anything positive about their bodies of work. They have worked on other "Meine Mutter..." films before, but even when they did not, everything else they did, was equally low-quality wise. Just like these 1.5 hours. Pfannenschmidt, in contrast to Neumann, has onnly worked on this series in recent years, which is probably a good thing, so you won't see his "talent" in other projects. He is also almost 70 already, kinda sad when at this age, this is the stuff you are stuck with. Shows that he probably never had any talent and never will. Neumann is "only" slightly over 50, but even there I see almost no hope he can find his way (back) to quality. As for the cast, Amft and Luca are really defining actors when it comes to trashy romance dramas/comedies with zero artistic value. There have been many in the 21st century and those two have been a part of many times. So actually, everything is a failure here. Luckily, these garbage films tend to become less now since 2015 or so, which is amazing, but these two are surely despicable and cringeworthy enough to try and keep the "genre" going. Enough said. No mercy on them. Yes, they are this bad. Margarita Broich, who plays the mother here, may not be on the same level and she has had okay projects in her career, but the fact that she agrees to be a part of this franchise also does not say anything positive about her at all. The rest of the cast I am not familiar with, but they arenn't good either. The exception is Kunze-Libnow (also with a double name for her character here) and with her I will always think of Stromberg. But that is okay. She only has one brief scene in this film here anyway.
Now, I want to mention a few scenes and plot references that made it really easy for me to despise this film. The first is key already: The depiction of autism. It was absolutely embarrassing and a true insult to people who really have this illness. It felt like with Mia, the girl who has it, they simply read a book on autism and included every single reference and symptome they found in there in this film. There is not a single scene when she acts "normal". And then her character's mother's show up defending her by saying she only has a mild form. Okay, we saw that. Very accurate. But why I am I even surprised. Did I really expect the writer for a trashy film like this, who has failed many times before, to deliver in terms of subtlety? Obviously not. The opposite is true. There are many bad examples, the worst may be however from this "emotional" scene when she meets her father for the first time and says something like how he is a handsome man and also all out of nowhere speaks about his negative character traits as if she knew him for a long long time already. Speaking of that, another reference back to the poster here on imdb. Take a look at it and you will find the anti-male aspect immediately. It is okay to put two women at the center of the story, but as soon as it turns out anti-male, which it does a lot with Degeto, it is no longer okay. However, gender discrimination only works one direction in the liberal mainstream media, so they are getting away with it. Okay, let's not drift away too far here and go back to this movie. I personally found one moment pretty hilarious because of the unintended irony, namely when Amft's character says to her mother what a coincidence it is that now the girl shows up, now that they were talking about grandchildren. And it is true, it is very unrealistic and another cancer to this movie in fact. The mother (Broich's character) does not have a lot of screen time here and it almost seems they have no idea anymore what to do with her character. However, she also gets her one big scene of full cringe, namely when she plays this card game with her granddaughter. Granddaughter? Did you realize something? Yep, even more title failure. Mia is not her grandchild, she is merely her son-in-law's daughter and yet there is a happy ending, there is closure etc. Also in terms of how Amft's character struggles with the girl's behavior. I assume they wanted to make a statement about tolerance there, obviously with being 1% daring only, and always making sure we see Amft's character as likable. It did not work out. Just like everything else here. Like the general depiction of autism. One moment stayed especially in my mind representing all the other cringeworthy moments and that was about the quote "Alles im Eimer", an exaggerated metaphoric playful way for "all is lost" (difficult to explain in German because there is no exact translation in English using a bucket), and the girl responds "which bucket?" and with this they wanted to show us how the girl understands everything verbally. I really cringed there to be honest. Also of course, pseudo drama stories about disappeared dogs and kids (the latter you always get in these films when children are involved) are included. More nonsense. Anything positive I can say here? Ah yes, Nikolaus Benda's character is decent as always and really the only bright spot in these films. I think I also liked him in the one other film from the franchise I saw. He is pretty funny at times, as funny as the script lets him be, and his conversation with the girl, even if it was very brief, about Wayne and other stuff was pretty cool. Okay, no I will stop though before you get a wrong idea that I could only like this film one bit. It is definitely not the case. Actually, there is also failure to this character because he is mostly only there for us to not forget how desirable Diana Amft is (nope! big no!) and men really want her. Speaking of the men, Luca's character still deserves a mention with how his professional success is depicted here and how the stars are referenced for his restaurant, what an amazing man, and how he is on so friendly terms with his employees etc. Cringe 100%. Also his comment about the sun in Madeira (and the outfit hes does not choose as a consequence) is a prime example of how he was talking to the audience and not to his partner. They even think the viewers are stupid enough to not know about the weather in Madeira. Then again, it could be true for those who like this movie. Fat thumbs-down and highly not recommended. I feel sorry for actual autists with the way this film wants us to believe they are. This series needs to stop. The first film was already one too mayn and let's not even talk about the fact that, by now, they stand at no less than four sequels.
Now, I want to mention a few scenes and plot references that made it really easy for me to despise this film. The first is key already: The depiction of autism. It was absolutely embarrassing and a true insult to people who really have this illness. It felt like with Mia, the girl who has it, they simply read a book on autism and included every single reference and symptome they found in there in this film. There is not a single scene when she acts "normal". And then her character's mother's show up defending her by saying she only has a mild form. Okay, we saw that. Very accurate. But why I am I even surprised. Did I really expect the writer for a trashy film like this, who has failed many times before, to deliver in terms of subtlety? Obviously not. The opposite is true. There are many bad examples, the worst may be however from this "emotional" scene when she meets her father for the first time and says something like how he is a handsome man and also all out of nowhere speaks about his negative character traits as if she knew him for a long long time already. Speaking of that, another reference back to the poster here on imdb. Take a look at it and you will find the anti-male aspect immediately. It is okay to put two women at the center of the story, but as soon as it turns out anti-male, which it does a lot with Degeto, it is no longer okay. However, gender discrimination only works one direction in the liberal mainstream media, so they are getting away with it. Okay, let's not drift away too far here and go back to this movie. I personally found one moment pretty hilarious because of the unintended irony, namely when Amft's character says to her mother what a coincidence it is that now the girl shows up, now that they were talking about grandchildren. And it is true, it is very unrealistic and another cancer to this movie in fact. The mother (Broich's character) does not have a lot of screen time here and it almost seems they have no idea anymore what to do with her character. However, she also gets her one big scene of full cringe, namely when she plays this card game with her granddaughter. Granddaughter? Did you realize something? Yep, even more title failure. Mia is not her grandchild, she is merely her son-in-law's daughter and yet there is a happy ending, there is closure etc. Also in terms of how Amft's character struggles with the girl's behavior. I assume they wanted to make a statement about tolerance there, obviously with being 1% daring only, and always making sure we see Amft's character as likable. It did not work out. Just like everything else here. Like the general depiction of autism. One moment stayed especially in my mind representing all the other cringeworthy moments and that was about the quote "Alles im Eimer", an exaggerated metaphoric playful way for "all is lost" (difficult to explain in German because there is no exact translation in English using a bucket), and the girl responds "which bucket?" and with this they wanted to show us how the girl understands everything verbally. I really cringed there to be honest. Also of course, pseudo drama stories about disappeared dogs and kids (the latter you always get in these films when children are involved) are included. More nonsense. Anything positive I can say here? Ah yes, Nikolaus Benda's character is decent as always and really the only bright spot in these films. I think I also liked him in the one other film from the franchise I saw. He is pretty funny at times, as funny as the script lets him be, and his conversation with the girl, even if it was very brief, about Wayne and other stuff was pretty cool. Okay, no I will stop though before you get a wrong idea that I could only like this film one bit. It is definitely not the case. Actually, there is also failure to this character because he is mostly only there for us to not forget how desirable Diana Amft is (nope! big no!) and men really want her. Speaking of the men, Luca's character still deserves a mention with how his professional success is depicted here and how the stars are referenced for his restaurant, what an amazing man, and how he is on so friendly terms with his employees etc. Cringe 100%. Also his comment about the sun in Madeira (and the outfit hes does not choose as a consequence) is a prime example of how he was talking to the audience and not to his partner. They even think the viewers are stupid enough to not know about the weather in Madeira. Then again, it could be true for those who like this movie. Fat thumbs-down and highly not recommended. I feel sorry for actual autists with the way this film wants us to believe they are. This series needs to stop. The first film was already one too mayn and let's not even talk about the fact that, by now, they stand at no less than four sequels.
