"Der verlorene Sohn", which means "The Lost Son", is a German television movie from 2009, so this one has its 10th anniversary this year. Like most other small screen released movies here in Germany, this one runs for approximately 90 minutes, slightly under in fact. The director is Nina Grosse and the script is another collaboration by father and daughter Breinersdorfer and the former is certainly more known for examplefor his work on the Oscar-nominated Sophie Scholl. But we spoke about that one on another occasions. Lets take a look at this one here. It is about a young man who comes back to Germany after his imprisonment ended and he had been in prison because he was convicted for his connections to Islamic terrorism. He himself converted to Islam and the question if he is a terrorist himself is always at the center of this movie. This is okay because it keeps up the suspense. The problem is that there is really almost nothing else to this movie. I am not a fan of Kostja Ullmann at all and his turn here did not change anything about that. Admittedly, it was a very ungrateful role you could say. Most of the time, he just had to be quiet and make an expression as if he just isn't in the mood for anything. Now there are more challenging moments like the meltdown after the big handball game, but Ullmann definitely did not nail these either. Besides, there is a difference between giving a quietly convincing performance and giving a lackluster performance and for K.U. it is certainly closer to the latter. The again, his entire role feels just theer to get the most memorable and baitiest (does such a word exist??) performance out of female lead actress Katja Flint who palys his mother struggling with her desperate attemmpts to welcome him back in the family and reintegrate him going up against not only the young man's own struggles, but also the other brother being clearly overwhelmed by the situation.
Okay the references about Islam are not particularly smart I must say, but not really bad either. But as a whole, the film feels rather empty and the question if he is evil or not (just misguided) alone is not enough to carry the movie for 1.5 hours, even if I was curious about the final sequence telling us the answer. Well, they somehow did tell us the answer there, even if it was not 100% safe. I will spare you the details from the unnecessary spoiler perspective. But let me say that the idea that the mother and other sun chase him down at the station is pretty exaggerated with no police around and did not feel too realistic. Oh well, actually there is police around, namely one police officer who is clearly not ready to come with the situation and starts crying while Flint's character next to her gets the most stereotypical and unspired powerful woman approach. They really messed up there a theoretically fine ending. At least at its very core. Anyway, the rest of the cast is not too known. Ferydoni is really easy on the yes and has played in a few known films and series too, so maybe she is the third most famous actor in here. I did like Wölbern too, who gives an okay performance as a character that has very little to work woth. Generally the way police are depicted in here is pretty embarrassing and has little to do with reality. I mean when all of a sudden they really find the young man's ally, the French guy, now that was ridiculous. Or how they are too late etc. I think they also could have used police to come up with a better ending. For example it could have been interesting if the other guy (the Frenchie) had been an undercover agent or so, of course only with proper elaboration and build-up. Otherwise it would have been even worse. Overall, it is an average quality German television film where nothing stands really out and I wonder how this film would look like in the days of way over-the-top political correctness here in Germany if it had been made today. Probably there would be no mention specifically of Islam or so. But yeah, they just made it too easy for themselves with the video on his laptop, the mother suddenly cooperating with the police out of nowhere and also the end that I already wrote a lot about. Don't watch.
Okay the references about Islam are not particularly smart I must say, but not really bad either. But as a whole, the film feels rather empty and the question if he is evil or not (just misguided) alone is not enough to carry the movie for 1.5 hours, even if I was curious about the final sequence telling us the answer. Well, they somehow did tell us the answer there, even if it was not 100% safe. I will spare you the details from the unnecessary spoiler perspective. But let me say that the idea that the mother and other sun chase him down at the station is pretty exaggerated with no police around and did not feel too realistic. Oh well, actually there is police around, namely one police officer who is clearly not ready to come with the situation and starts crying while Flint's character next to her gets the most stereotypical and unspired powerful woman approach. They really messed up there a theoretically fine ending. At least at its very core. Anyway, the rest of the cast is not too known. Ferydoni is really easy on the yes and has played in a few known films and series too, so maybe she is the third most famous actor in here. I did like Wölbern too, who gives an okay performance as a character that has very little to work woth. Generally the way police are depicted in here is pretty embarrassing and has little to do with reality. I mean when all of a sudden they really find the young man's ally, the French guy, now that was ridiculous. Or how they are too late etc. I think they also could have used police to come up with a better ending. For example it could have been interesting if the other guy (the Frenchie) had been an undercover agent or so, of course only with proper elaboration and build-up. Otherwise it would have been even worse. Overall, it is an average quality German television film where nothing stands really out and I wonder how this film would look like in the days of way over-the-top political correctness here in Germany if it had been made today. Probably there would be no mention specifically of Islam or so. But yeah, they just made it too easy for themselves with the video on his laptop, the mother suddenly cooperating with the police out of nowhere and also the end that I already wrote a lot about. Don't watch.
