chris-heilmann Reviews

We Children from Bahnhof Zoo (2021)

Too enjoyable to watch for the story it represents

[6/10 · 12 April 2021]

If you were born in or around the 80s in Germany, there was no way around "Christiane F. - wir Kinder von Bahnhof Zoo". The 1978 book and following 1981 movie was part of the school curriculum to scare students straight about the effects of drugs. And with good reason. The story of Christiane, fast-tracking into Heroin addiction and becoming a prostitute at the age of 13 is shocking and was an important message to tell. Fast forward to now where Amazon took on the material to create a 8 episode series out of it in hope to make the message resound better to a newer generation. And it is an OK experience. Whilst in the original story the cast was small and the people Christiane met were either abusers or her unreliable junkie boyfriend here we get introduced to a group of people. Christiane, who tries to fit in with the cool crowd at school and fast tracking into drugs that way. Stella, the tough girl whose alcoholic mother owns a pub and suffers assault in many different ways. Babsi, a very young posh girl who is suicidal and suffers from the loss of her father. Benno, the dysfunctional boyfriend and a right tosser. Michael, who is there to also take drugs and has a crush on Benno. And Axel, a long haired ginger guy (so you know he is a good one) who is a functioning heroin taker. He's the one that has a job, gets up in time and reminds the others to try to sort out their lives. Add to this the families of all the characters and there is a lot to cover and often the show meanders into too much detail. There are also dream sequences that feel odd. The first scene shows an older Christiane on a private plane party with David Bowie (I think, not much resemblance there) and then it flashes back to "8 years earlier". We never get back to this story and I have no idea why that is in there.

All in all the show is beautifully shot, the acting is great and as with any drug related movie, the soundtrack is incredible. It is time well spent watching it and was quite an effort to make. However, it is let down by its script and writing. Instead of being a shocking display of a horrendous story, the disgusting and horrible parts are played down and the fun parts of drugs, the partying and the coolness of people is amped up. You feel like the makers tried to take a pinch of Tarantino, 24 hour party people, Train Spotting and a lot of Guy Ritchie an make a "cool" version of the story. You don't see much syringe marks or utterly messed up people. People come out fresh as a daisy after a night on the horse. The sugar daddies the girls get are complacent and dysfunctional, not overstepping any agreements. When the group all prostitute themselves they stay freelance - there are no abusive pimps or depictions of the extortion of the already down-on-their-luck people. The biggest criticism has to be that people look too good. The "junkie chic" is strong in this one and even more annoying is that the girls are depicted as much older than they were in reality. I guess making 13 year olds play prostitutes on screen went out of fashion with Taxi Driver. This show is good, but it is too enjoyable to watch. It's been stripped of the realities of the book and padded with too many characters and some B-stories that go nowhere at all. Take 10% of the disgusting depictions in "The Golden Glove" and tone down the "first it is really cool to do drugs..." and you would have had a worthy successor to an incredibly important story.

Zack Snyder's Justice League (2021)

Salvaged the mess that was the theatrical release and now enjoyable

[7/10 · 18 March 2021]

Justice League the Snyder Cut is actually 4 hours long, and thus gives him enough time to remedy the dumpster fire that was the theatrical release and Snyder/Whedon crossover. And I would say it is worth it. No spoilers, but here's what is fixed and much better:

👍🏼 They allowed the rendering of Steppenwolf's CGI character to finish this time. He looks much cooler and not as awkward. He also is comprehensible. 👍🏼 The Russian family and city to evacuate is gone, this sub plot made no sense and didn't go anywhere 👍🏼 Wonder Woman isn't a sad sack in this one but brings a lot to the table - especially exposition. She explains the Steppenwolf plot in detail. 👍🏼 The Flash is wonderfully awkward, funny and central to the story this time. They didn't make poor Ezra say nonsense BS like "what is brunch?" this time 👍🏼 Cyborg isn't a "why is he here" character, but the hero of the story 👍🏼 Batman's desperation to put together a group to defend the earth is well written out this time 👍🏼 There is a new Justice League character introduced and the reveal is gorgeous 👍🏼 The nightmare Batman had in BvS is explained and re-visited 👍🏼 The movie ties the backstories of each character together, which is something the theatrical release utterly failed to do. In a desperate attempt to match Avenger's success DC hoped people would already know, but if they had started with single character movies other than Superman and Batman this would have been so much easier to grasp.

Ok, now the negatives:

👎🏼 Some scenes are still painfully bad CGI and choppy animation. Much like we had in Black Panther. 👎🏼 Many scenes are skipworthy and dragged out far too long. The amazon fight for the motherbox seems not to end and we already know the outcome. It feels like 300 but with very muscly women having an incomprehensible accent to match Gal Gadot's. 👎🏼 The music is annoying and out of place. There is a lot of singing, albeit in Icelandic (I think), but some of the English lyrics are ridiculously terrible. Best example is when Aquaman saves the boat crew (a scene that could have been cut as it brings nothing to the table) 👎🏼 Aquaman is still Jason Momoa and bro-ing it up. Not as much as in the theatrical release, but the "My man" and surfing on a Parademon scenes are still in 👎🏼 Amber Heard's "British" accent made me miss the CGI mustache of Superman 👎🏼 Snyder is trying super hard to hint at more movies to come and Jared Leto's joker performance makes me want to scream.

All in all, worth it though, but you do feel the running time very much. It is a classic case of a director's cut not wanting to waste any shot footage (also see: Metropolis, Apocalypse Now Redux...) I am happy this one happened and it made me look at the DCEU with more fondness again. 7/10

System Crasher (2019)

Georgeous, well done but eventually frustrating - maybe that's the point.

[4/10 · 2 March 2020]

OK, "System Crasher" is raking in rave reviews, but I found it one of the most frustrating movies to watch ever. It is the story of a traumatised child who acts out and is generally impossible to handle and thus gets moved from foster care to foster care and clinic to clinic until one of the orderlies whose job it is to deal with aggressive teens and re-introduce them to society takes on the case. The setup of him as a well-loved, soft spoken and in control helper is gorgeous. The acting of the girl playing the disturbed Betty is outstanding. The camera work depicting her mental state and fragmented memory flashbacks is surprising and interesting. But the movies drags on and repeats the same topic ad nauseam. There are some surprises and some generally scary scenes, but all in all it all plays up to a non-existing climax. It just ends. It is an important topic and there is a lot to make this work and be important but I felt cheated in the end. Where depicting McMurphy in "One flew over the cuckoo's nest" as the hero, the uplifting music and frantic cuts every time Betty yet again foils another well-intentioned attempt to protect her from herself feels just annoying. She is no hero, there is no system she breaks and if it means that normal society can't deal with her, what's the alternative?