Writer/director Ilker Çatak follows his promising coming-of-age film (STAMBUL GARDEN/’21 - https://maksquibs.blogspot.com/2023/09/stambul-garden-aka-blurred-lines.html) with a High School in crisis drama that’s either been short-listed or awarded on prize lists around the globe. That crisis? - a wave of thefts at the school, with escalating suspicion ricocheting from cleaning staff to teachers to administration and, of course, the student body. That’s where the real trouble starts as a recent hire, a permanent sub from Poland, stands by as her well-run classroom is subjected to an obviously illegal search & seizure by the school principal and her top assistant. Informers also welcome. Yikes! Can these professionals truly be so clueless on personal rights? (I know, I know, it’s a German school . . . but still.) Naturally, it all quickly spirals out of control when a young non-German kid is tagged with a pocketful of cash, his parents’ easy explanation gets a quick apology but taints the kid in class. But this isn't one of those stories where a bad faith mistake can’t be neatly corrected, and where every attempt at an honest course correction only makes things worse. Instead, Çatak continues to poison the well, piling on stupid moves by staff & students far past any dramatically purposeful point. (We'll buy one dumb move, but a dozen?) It’s a structure best suited to farce, when every hotel door is the wrong hotel door. (Oops! I was looking for my wife . . . oh, there she is; under the blanket!) But Çatak’s not exactly a guy with a sense of humor!, while this sort of issue-oriented realism needs but one moment of irreversible stupidity, followed by smart, caring responses that somehow still make things go from bad to worse, to function. Smart good intentions, not dumb good intentions. A beginner’s dramatic mistake you didn’t see coming after STAMBUL, his less acclaimed if more accomplished previous film.
DOUBLE-BILL: Leonie Benesch, who plays the teacher, must specialize in well-intentioned helpers who self-destruct, her best-known role the blindsided/unlucky housekeeper in the third season of BABYLON BERLIN. Itself a distinct fall-off from the startlingly fine first two seasons. Still good, just over-egged.
ATTENTION MUST BE PAID: Those Germans don’t stint on their High School facilities!
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