"Anna's Erbe" is a German television film from 2011, so this one will have its tenth anniversary next year, in fact very late next year because this aired originally during the Christmas season. The title means "Anna's Secret" and this is a sequel to a movie called "Anna's Secret" from three years earlier. I watched this first film like five years ago or so and I gotta say I remember nothing about it really, which does not surprise me however. Looking at the rating I have it back then, I guess I was probably fairly generous and I am sure I would not give the same today again. Maybe I will rewatch it at some point. We will see. This one here is completely dommed for failure though. Not only because it got ordered/produced by the infamous ARD Degeto whose films almost always suck, but also if you take a look at the bodies of work by director Gärtner and writer Krapoth (the k should be a c), then you know immediately that you got 1.5 pretty abysmal hours ahead of you. This is exactly how it turns out. Pretty unreal to see how the director has basically done (almost) nothing but come up with really bad projects for 30 years now and the writer at least as bad for the last 20 years, so this film here was pretty much from the middle of her career as of now you could say. Really shameful that these two still get picked for new projects. There is no visible talented to them whatsoever and that is really a very gentle way to put it. This lack of vision also extends effortlessly to the cast as Jutta Speidel reprises her role from the first film of course. She is the title character, so it would not have worked without her. She is basically an older version of the likes of Thomalla, Neubauer, Furzwängler and other actress who get picked frequently for lead roles in television films despite the complete absence of talent, simply because people know tham and that is it. I find her unwatchable at times honestly how she goes full ham constantly and is not even able to pull of the most simple scenes. The best example of that we get here early on when she is looking for her glasses annd her husband tells her they are on her head. This was almost the first scene actually. I guess it was supposed to show us in a "funny" way how the protagonist is likably clumsy. Or I don't know. Maybe also how close she and her husband still are. Said husband is played by Dietrich Hollinderbäumer and the fact that he is credited far behind and the second word in the title make it obvious he has to go, so the film is about nobody else than Speidel really anymore, even if they act as if it is. But that is only because they have completely run out of ideas for Speidel's character. Hollinderbäumer is also one from the terrible heute-show gang though, so I can't go easy on him. No surprise he shows up in trashy films like this one. There's others equally bad where he is in the cast list. The art of make-believe. As for the supporting cast, no big names at all. Not even mediocre names. Susanne Schäfer and Anna Hausburg play the protagonist's daughter and granddaughter, which kinda had me thinking that this film included three generations of failure, even if the characters are of course related and not the actresses. But with the exception of Thalbach maybe, this could not be the case in any German movie. Okay, let's not drift away now. One more thing I want to say here still is that I applaud the director of the first film for not returning. Great choice. Which makes it even more despicable for the writer to return and for the director who took over that they were ready and willing for this one. But I elaborated on those earlier already.
Okay, I want (or have to) mention a few moments of the story and plots here to make it obvious what a terrible film this is. First of all: Speidel. She has many, many bad moments. I already mentioned a smaller moment where her absence of talent becomes extremely obvious. Another smaller moment would be how she falls down in the yard becuase somebody els eputs something somewhere where it shouldn't be. But it is also the case in those dramatically important scenes when she gets water or something for her dying husband and also how she has this crying attack near the end when she does all this cycling is very telling. This actress is not even good enough for the smalles supporting performance. So forced and hammy all along. Then again, she was in good company in this film because Schäfer felt almost as bad in their shared sequences and Hausburg also seems on the "right" track for that. A look into her body of work makes this painfully obvious. I generally do not talk this harshly about young(er) actresses, but for her it could not be any more true. The story with her pregnancy is difficult to swallow. Also really charming girl who does not care about birth control apparently and also calls the father of her unborn child a really mean word towards the end. And yet the boy talks about eternal love. Haha of course. Clearly shows here that this is a female centered movie. Imagine him calling her a c*** out of nowhere in the end. But no, it's only okay of the girl makes fun of herself, like her hands on one occasion. Well, good luck to the boy for the next 60 (or more years) of being humiliated. Of course, there is also pseudo drama with an abortion being an option, but Degeto is zero daring, so she will have the child in the end. The way it was depicted with this note and the pseudo drama that she ran away (happens so often in these kind of films that young characters run away) could not have been any more uninspired. Of course, our likable heroine (Speidel) is also the one that the young woman talks to first about her pregnancy. Not to the father. Not to the mother. To her grandmother. Obviously. Grandmother and her daughter also have afalling-out because of that, which is obviously solved in the end in the sense of a pretty bad and for-the-sake-of-it happy ending. ust like so many other times with Degeto. One who Speidel's character, however, is not as charming with is her loyal farm hand Marek (same name as the actor). When he has the very bizarre idea that her daughter might replace him for whatever reason on the farm (the film is set on an apple farm), then Speidel's character gets really mad and treats him with zero respect. I guess this was to show us what a dedicated woman she is. Not much later, Marek is considering moving to a different employer and boy he should have. Speidel's character gets mad again. But of course, in the face of his employer's greatness he eventually stays. No surprise here at all. The other guy is if I remember correctly ther father of the women in the middle age-wise. What a coincidence! And what a small world. Anyway, there are also indicators that this other employer, a successful businessman is also romantically interested in Speidel's character too. Of course she is one who could have all them men with what an amazing woman she is. And what's up with Marek? Well, he also had some pseudo conflict with Schäfer's character and honestly I was just waiting for those two to become a couple as well. Would have perfectly fit this film and there's always a way to make thing worse, no matter how bad they are already. This movie is really cringeworthy to watch. I could mention another dozen scenes where it was so bad it was almost funny in fact, but I will just give you three, namely when the daughter sells an apple bevarage from the farm and mother stands next to her and nods. Or when the boy is about to go see the pregnant girl on the bench and her mother and grandmother stand there and show us (and him) with their eyes that he must go. Women in charge. Cough. Okay, and the third is when the two younger women decide in the car to return and spend the summer with Speidel's character and then at her doorstep ask her if it's okay and she says somethhing like she has no choice. Unwatchable as I said. I really wish they just would have driven on because then this mess of a movie would have been over after 30 minutes max and not after 1.5 hours. Plain terrible. Highly not recommended. The pseudo elite ideas of Danish last names or big music careers make things only worse. The only good thing here is really that it stayed a duology and no third movie followed. But no worries, the key cast members, the trio, have been in enough other projects that were complete trash.
Okay, I want (or have to) mention a few moments of the story and plots here to make it obvious what a terrible film this is. First of all: Speidel. She has many, many bad moments. I already mentioned a smaller moment where her absence of talent becomes extremely obvious. Another smaller moment would be how she falls down in the yard becuase somebody els eputs something somewhere where it shouldn't be. But it is also the case in those dramatically important scenes when she gets water or something for her dying husband and also how she has this crying attack near the end when she does all this cycling is very telling. This actress is not even good enough for the smalles supporting performance. So forced and hammy all along. Then again, she was in good company in this film because Schäfer felt almost as bad in their shared sequences and Hausburg also seems on the "right" track for that. A look into her body of work makes this painfully obvious. I generally do not talk this harshly about young(er) actresses, but for her it could not be any more true. The story with her pregnancy is difficult to swallow. Also really charming girl who does not care about birth control apparently and also calls the father of her unborn child a really mean word towards the end. And yet the boy talks about eternal love. Haha of course. Clearly shows here that this is a female centered movie. Imagine him calling her a c*** out of nowhere in the end. But no, it's only okay of the girl makes fun of herself, like her hands on one occasion. Well, good luck to the boy for the next 60 (or more years) of being humiliated. Of course, there is also pseudo drama with an abortion being an option, but Degeto is zero daring, so she will have the child in the end. The way it was depicted with this note and the pseudo drama that she ran away (happens so often in these kind of films that young characters run away) could not have been any more uninspired. Of course, our likable heroine (Speidel) is also the one that the young woman talks to first about her pregnancy. Not to the father. Not to the mother. To her grandmother. Obviously. Grandmother and her daughter also have afalling-out because of that, which is obviously solved in the end in the sense of a pretty bad and for-the-sake-of-it happy ending. ust like so many other times with Degeto. One who Speidel's character, however, is not as charming with is her loyal farm hand Marek (same name as the actor). When he has the very bizarre idea that her daughter might replace him for whatever reason on the farm (the film is set on an apple farm), then Speidel's character gets really mad and treats him with zero respect. I guess this was to show us what a dedicated woman she is. Not much later, Marek is considering moving to a different employer and boy he should have. Speidel's character gets mad again. But of course, in the face of his employer's greatness he eventually stays. No surprise here at all. The other guy is if I remember correctly ther father of the women in the middle age-wise. What a coincidence! And what a small world. Anyway, there are also indicators that this other employer, a successful businessman is also romantically interested in Speidel's character too. Of course she is one who could have all them men with what an amazing woman she is. And what's up with Marek? Well, he also had some pseudo conflict with Schäfer's character and honestly I was just waiting for those two to become a couple as well. Would have perfectly fit this film and there's always a way to make thing worse, no matter how bad they are already. This movie is really cringeworthy to watch. I could mention another dozen scenes where it was so bad it was almost funny in fact, but I will just give you three, namely when the daughter sells an apple bevarage from the farm and mother stands next to her and nods. Or when the boy is about to go see the pregnant girl on the bench and her mother and grandmother stand there and show us (and him) with their eyes that he must go. Women in charge. Cough. Okay, and the third is when the two younger women decide in the car to return and spend the summer with Speidel's character and then at her doorstep ask her if it's okay and she says somethhing like she has no choice. Unwatchable as I said. I really wish they just would have driven on because then this mess of a movie would have been over after 30 minutes max and not after 1.5 hours. Plain terrible. Highly not recommended. The pseudo elite ideas of Danish last names or big music careers make things only worse. The only good thing here is really that it stayed a duology and no third movie followed. But no worries, the key cast members, the trio, have been in enough other projects that were complete trash.
