"Vater werden ist nicht schwer" is a German television film from 2004, so this one had its 15th anniversary already last year and (sadly) it is still on national television nowadays. It runs for 1.5 hours, minimally under, as they usually do and the director here is René Heisig, a man who has been in filmmaking since the early 1990s already, so a really long time, even back then in 2004. His last credit here on imdb is from 2013 though, so he may be retired now, even if he is not that old. Just turned 60 last week. Lookin at his body of work, I would not say it is terrible, but it is also far from good and includes many projects you definitely want to skip. This is one of them. I will get to that later in terms of reasons. Heisig almost never wrote the screenplays for his films and episodes, so no surprise he didn't here either. The one who did is Dorothee Schön. Not a body of work to be proud of either, especially what she did in the first ten years of the new millennium and this movie we got here is a perfect example of that. However, it seems that in the last decade she managed to step things up a bit and has worked on better stuff. Her very recent contribution to Charité, a fairly successful historic series from my country, is just one project that received a better reception. If it will from me is something that still needs to be evaluated. Her contribution here makes me skeptical. She is about the same age as the director by the way, will turn 60 next year. By the way the title means something along the lines that it is not difficult to become a father as this film is about a guy around the age of 50 who meets his dad for the firstg time. Or at least he thinks he does. The cast includes three familiar faces, all of them male actors. German film buffs will certainly have come across August Zirner here and there and same is probably true for Florian Stetter, who even played in an Oscar-nominated movie just one year after this one. But the one I would like to talk a bit more about is Heinz Baumann. He is retired now as well, but as he is in his 90s already, that is just very deserved, especially because he started acting in the mid-1950s. I remember him mostly from the Adelheid television series starring Evelyn Hamann and I am sure that applies to most others too. But he has pretty good recognition value, also some nice range I think and decent comedic timing. In this film here, he reminded me almost a bit of Bud Spencer. I mean he is obviously not beating anybody up, but the way his character talked to people here and there almost felt as if he was channeling his inner Bud, also what he was saying exactly. Still I think it is a bit sad that with a really long and fine career, he still shoed up in his mid70s for trashy films like this. But it is really just the exception that confirms the rule as we say here in Germany. Otherwise, his body of work is utterly convincing. And even here he elevated the material at times and this already really bad and unrealistic film would have been even worse with somebody else playing the central character. One final quick cast mention too to Anna Schuhmacher. She did not have much to work with, but her looks stay in the mind for me, even if it is probably safe to say that we will never see her in any other film again as this is her only imdb credit and so much time has passed.
Okay, now I want to emphasize some aspects and scenes and inclusions that make it easy for me to say that this is a very low film. I wanted to like it, mostly because of Baumann, but it just wasn't possible. The story does not make enough sense most of the time and it rarely feels authentic, realistic or genuinely creative. It begins right away and I was very surprised how this nun talked to Baumann's character in such a mean manner. I mean I get ithe is a rough, gruff fella, but that was just inappropriate for a person in that position to remind him how unlikable he is, how for years nobody ever came to visit him etc. Not my biggest criticism admittedly. The very biggest is probably the ending. I should mention this later, but for me it was such a crucial flaw story-wise that it was truly decisive for me in determining whether I call this a weak movie or a bad movie and as you can see from my rating I am going with the latter. I am talking about the fact how the family does not care one bit that the man is responsible for them never being able to meet the actual father of Zirner's character, the actual grandfather of Stetter's character although apparently he wanted to meet them finally. Instead, he died on his own because of this little scam by Baumann's character and still at the same time they realize they liked Baumann's character enough to look for him again and get him back into their lives. I mean, even I as somebody who likes Baumann (and I made that clear for sure) cannot accept this as realistic story-telling. Okay, then there is this idea how the characters are suspecting that he may not be the actual father and they are right of course, but there is no real indicator why they think so other than that they are right. Or what bothered me is how Baumann's character is depicted as somebody really anti-social and yet he seems to be getting along pretty well with the characters immediately. I mean you can make the argument that he does not want contact with others and that is why he became who he became, but still it is not good enough of an explanation for me, especially because when they are at the department store or so he says that his "son" should not be going for the loner role he went for. The scene with the old woman / the mother is also cringeworthy. I mean it as supposed to be awkward and was staged obviously, but it was not half as entertaining as it could have been and as they acted it was.There's much more. The entire affair story is a bad joke. Be it how the old man finds out about it so quickly or about how the affair talks to her lover's wife as if she was his shrink. So ridiculous and not in a good way. They really wanted to make sure we see only the wife as worthy for Zirner's character, even if she was not 10% as attractive as the affair. I guess the pseudo meaningful message that looks aren't everything was mostly intended for the not so attractive female audience members. Also cringeworthy how the young man during the class and Baumann's character after he sees her treat the affair as not worthy. I still think this is a movie mostly for female audiences. And I applaud every single one of them that sees through this charade. The males too of course. Equality is key. Okay, I guess this is pretty much enough now. This movie gets a massive thumbs-down from me, also for the forced and very unauthentic happy ending. Quite shameful this is still shown on national television so many years, decades almost, after its original release. Best would have been if this never got made. Your GEZ money at work, folks. Definitely skip.
Okay, now I want to emphasize some aspects and scenes and inclusions that make it easy for me to say that this is a very low film. I wanted to like it, mostly because of Baumann, but it just wasn't possible. The story does not make enough sense most of the time and it rarely feels authentic, realistic or genuinely creative. It begins right away and I was very surprised how this nun talked to Baumann's character in such a mean manner. I mean I get ithe is a rough, gruff fella, but that was just inappropriate for a person in that position to remind him how unlikable he is, how for years nobody ever came to visit him etc. Not my biggest criticism admittedly. The very biggest is probably the ending. I should mention this later, but for me it was such a crucial flaw story-wise that it was truly decisive for me in determining whether I call this a weak movie or a bad movie and as you can see from my rating I am going with the latter. I am talking about the fact how the family does not care one bit that the man is responsible for them never being able to meet the actual father of Zirner's character, the actual grandfather of Stetter's character although apparently he wanted to meet them finally. Instead, he died on his own because of this little scam by Baumann's character and still at the same time they realize they liked Baumann's character enough to look for him again and get him back into their lives. I mean, even I as somebody who likes Baumann (and I made that clear for sure) cannot accept this as realistic story-telling. Okay, then there is this idea how the characters are suspecting that he may not be the actual father and they are right of course, but there is no real indicator why they think so other than that they are right. Or what bothered me is how Baumann's character is depicted as somebody really anti-social and yet he seems to be getting along pretty well with the characters immediately. I mean you can make the argument that he does not want contact with others and that is why he became who he became, but still it is not good enough of an explanation for me, especially because when they are at the department store or so he says that his "son" should not be going for the loner role he went for. The scene with the old woman / the mother is also cringeworthy. I mean it as supposed to be awkward and was staged obviously, but it was not half as entertaining as it could have been and as they acted it was.There's much more. The entire affair story is a bad joke. Be it how the old man finds out about it so quickly or about how the affair talks to her lover's wife as if she was his shrink. So ridiculous and not in a good way. They really wanted to make sure we see only the wife as worthy for Zirner's character, even if she was not 10% as attractive as the affair. I guess the pseudo meaningful message that looks aren't everything was mostly intended for the not so attractive female audience members. Also cringeworthy how the young man during the class and Baumann's character after he sees her treat the affair as not worthy. I still think this is a movie mostly for female audiences. And I applaud every single one of them that sees through this charade. The males too of course. Equality is key. Okay, I guess this is pretty much enough now. This movie gets a massive thumbs-down from me, also for the forced and very unauthentic happy ending. Quite shameful this is still shown on national television so many years, decades almost, after its original release. Best would have been if this never got made. Your GEZ money at work, folks. Definitely skip.