User Reviews

"Männersache" is a German 90-minute movie from 7 years ago written and directed by lead actor Mario Barth himself. His co-director is Gernot Roll, who proves once again that he may be a great cinematographer, but not a good director. And with the script, Barth got help from Dieter Tappert, his co-lead actor, who is more known as Paul Panzer. The cast includes a couple more famous names: Jürgen Vogel, Uwe Ochsenknecht, Anja Kling, Sido, Leander Haußmann and Michael Gwisdek play minor characters. Also in here is Thomas Thieme, a personal favorite of mine, but sadly not even he cannot keep this from being a complete mess. It fails completely in terms of both comedy and drama. This is not a funny film on any occasion. Barth gives the humor its usual approach and if you like him, you will probably like this film too. I personally think he is loud and annoying, but rarely entertaining in both his stand-up and his performance here. Also speaking about his stand-up, it is always about women-men difficulties and it has gotten repetitive beyond belief by now.

So yeah, I guess it is not unexpected that he made a film now too. Many equally untalented, less successful German comedians have done so and it always turned out disappointing. Same applies to this film. Even worse than the comedy is probably the drama. Cringeworthy acting and unauthentically unrealistic plot developments made this one painful to watch at times. It is ridiculous how serious the film takes itself during these dramatic parts. I also am not not sure what is worse, the flashback scenes or the fact that Barth (and Panzer to a lesser extent) play several other characters too in costumes obviously. Overall, a very weak film and I do not recommend seeing it. The IMDb rating is accurate and I am not sure what exactly the other reviewer here saw in this one. Stay away, my **/***** is still pretty generous.

I saw this movie at a pre-screening, so there might have been a lot of (unfinished) scenes in the movie that won't make it in the final cut. I am usually not a friend of Mario Barth's humor nor do find ordinary German comedies generally entertaining or funny but this movie sticks out from the 0815 crowd of similar films.

Spoiler: The film is about two childhood friends Paul and Hotte played by Mario Barth and Dieter Tappert (better known as Paul Panzer). Paul is working in a zoological department but dreams of becoming the next Jerry Lewis. He isn't very successful at trying as stand-up comedian at least not until he starts making fun of his best friend and the relationship with his girlfriend. Although they are as close to blood brothers as it could possibly get the situation starts to get out of hands. The sudden success seems to get to Paul's head and his new manager friend is making things even worse...

The movies story is as shallow as was to be expected with this kind of movie. The chemistry between the lead actors is good though and Tappert is surprisingly fresh in his role as Hotte. Michael Gwisdek as Paul's father Rudi is doing a fantastic job and is moral apostle of the movie. Anja Kling as Susi (Hotte's girlfriend) is as charming as she is scheming. She is the one, out of jealousy, who tries to tear the friendship apart between Paul and Hotte in the first place in order get have more time with her love. The movie also features a long list of celebrities in smaller, cameo style roles. Some of the movies potential is lost because it works too much with stereotypes and clichés. Some other gags are rather funny and I was truly entertained once the film gained momentum. Mario Barth is playing multiple roles and is doing a really good job (you got to love the character Marek!).

I am looking forward of seeing the final version of the film in 2009!