This week, some real highlights await you in the cinema you trust: because with “The survivors” includes a favorite of this year’s awards season, which was recently honored with five Oscar nominations. In addition, after 20 years there is the new film of “Girls Club – Beware of Bissig!” to the cinema, which as a musical adaptation “Mean Girls – The Girls Club” not only wants to revolutionize the word “fetch” for Gen Z.
In addition, two new films from Germany await you: First, the war drama ‘Stella. A life.” starring Paula Beer and Jannis Niewöhner, on the other side with “Home Sweet Home – Where evil livesA horror film that is rare in the German film landscape, which was recorded entirely without editing. The film even made it to our ‘German cinema is (still) great’ section. There’s also news from two “Star Wars” stars…
“Mean Girls – The Girls Club”
With the 2004 comedy “Girls Club – Be Careful!” Lindsay Lohan, Rachel McAdams, Amanda Seyfried and Tina Fey influenced an entire generation of teenagers, not only establishing the traditions of wearing pink on Wednesdays, celebrating October 3 annually or incorporating the neologism “fetch” into the language. The film’s success led to a musical adaptation on Broadway, now starring Samantha Jaynes and Arturo Perez Jr. play the leading role. “Mean Girls – The Girls Club” got its own film adaptation. Tina Fey returns not only as a screenwriter, but also in her role as teacher Miss Norbury, while Lohan and Co. will be replaced in the leading roles by Angourie Rice, Renée Rapp, Bebe Wood and Avantika.
Teenager Cady is new to high school, which is ruled by the “Plastics” girl clique centered around queen bee Regina George. When Cady attracts the unexpected attention of the popular gang, she and her outsiders Janice and Damien devise a plan to take down the ‘Plastics’… In our FILMSTARTS review Sidney Schering gave the musical a solid 4 out of 5 stars and writes: “The claws are clipped, but the coat shines more than ever! ‘Mean Girls – The Girls Club’ is the more optimistic, but no less sonorous and varied remix of the caustic teen cult hit from 2004.”
“The Remains”
Imagine if Harry Potter was stuck alone at Hogwarts with Snape over Christmas. The premise of Alexander Paynes is something like this “The Remainers”, in which unpopular teacher Paul Hunham (Paul Giamatti) must supervise a number of students at boarding school during the Christmas holidays in the 1970s who cannot return home. After a short time, he is alone with 15-year-old Angus (Dominic Sassa), who always attracts attention in everyday school life, even though he is a good student. Together with cook Mary (Da’Vine Joy Randolph), the two form an unusual Christmas trio.
While Paul Giamatti and Da’Vine Joy Randolph have already been honored with the Golden Globe for Best Actor in a Comedy and Best Supporting Actress, ‘The Holdovers’ is also nominated for five Oscars. In addition to the acting awards, these also include the categories of Best Film, Best Original Screenplay and Best Editing. In our FILMSTARTS review Oliver Kube gave the tragicomedy four stars and wrote: “A thoughtful, sometimes wonderfully light-hearted feel-good film with a brilliantly harmonizing trio of leading actors.”
“Stella. A life.’
In “Stella. A life” tells the story of the Jewish German Stella Goldschlag, who acted as a grabber in the Third Reich and thus betrayed other Jews to the Nazis. The biopic explores her journey there and follows a young woman who dreams of becoming a jazz singer until she is tortured by the Nazis during World War II and turns traitor.
Paula Beer (“Red Sky”) takes on the role of the historical figure, while Jannis Niewöhner (“Munich – In the Face of War”) plays the passport forger Rolf Isaakson. In our FILMSTARTS review Michael Meyns gave 3 out of 5 stars and writes: “The life of Stella Goldschlag could have become a complex, layered film about moral ambivalence. Kilian Reidhofs “Stella. A life.’ However, he acts too cautiously and is largely content with a detached retelling of the facts.”
“Home Sweet Home – Where Evil Lives”
After Sebastian Schipper presented the one-shot wonder ‘Victoria’ in 2015, Thomas Siebens is now taking action “Home Sweet Home – Where Evil Lives” follows in his footsteps and releases another film that requires no editing at all. However, unlike ‘Victoria’, ‘Home Sweet Home’ is a rarer film in the German film landscape – the horror genre is far too sparsely represented in this country. In it, Nilam Farooq and David Kross move as a newly engaged couple to an old country house, where more and more strange events begin to take place…
The film made it to our “German cinema is (still) great” section this month and is impressive with a 3.5-star rating in our FILMSTARTS review. Editor-in-chief Christoph Petersen writes: “The story itself is not particularly original, but Thomas Sieben always throws in elements that are not yet known from the one-shot genre – especially some strongly timed jump scares that you certainly wouldn’t expect under these filming conditions. And more importantly: thanks to the strong performances of Nilam Farooq and Justus von Dohnányi, there is a lot of tension!”
“The Awakening of the Huntress”
In “The Awakening of the Hunter” “Star Wars” star Daisy Ridley meets her “Star Wars” co-star Ben Mendelssohn for the first time – and immediately goes on the hunt for him. As the daughter of the infamous serial killer Marsh King, who held her captive in the woods with her mother as a child, she is drawn back into her past when the killer played by Mendelssohn escapes from prison. A dangerous game of cat and mouse ensues, in which her unusual knowledge of the swamps comes in surprisingly handy.
The film is based on the bestselling novel of the same name “The Moor Daughter” by Karen Dionne and was directed by “Ohne Limit” director Neil Burger. In our FILMSTARTS review Michael Meyns gave it 2.5 out of 5 stars and writes: “You really haven’t seen such a father-daughter relationship very often – but despite impressive images, ‘The Awakening of the Huntress’ oscillates too irresolutely between a psychogram and a survival thriller.”