"Caipiranha - Vorsicht, bissiger Nachbar!" or "War of Neighbours" or just "Caipiranha" is a German 80-minute film from 1998, so it will soon have its 20th anniversary. The title already gives away nicely what this one is about, namely the known trouble of Germans having arguments with their neighbors. The director is Felix Dünnemann and writer is Christoph Scholz. The former has worked on a handful other weak projects during his career and the latter has no other credit, which tells you already that the lack of talent and experience cannot result in a quality film here. No surprise this was a weak watch that was, despite being title a "comedy", never really funny. At least you get to see the stunning young Jasmin Gerat and sometimes you hear a classy old catchy song on some occasions. Story-wise, it was very absurd and very much over the top though. The dramatic impact with the poor man's Romeo and Juliet story did very little and was as forgettable as the performances, which is pretty disappointing as the cast includes a couple decent names such as Kaufmann, Gerat, Thalbach, Basedow, Giering and van Werveke. So with a better script and more talented filmmakers behind this one, this could actually have turned into a solid little movie. But for the actual outcome 4 stars out of 10 is still pretty generous. Don't watch.
2 Reviews
An exceptionally poor German comedy
kh-21 October 1998
This movie essentially is a "Romeo and Juliet" in a current German middle-class suburb with a humorous side-plot describing the war between two neighbors. It's supposed to be funny but actually it's offering the worst kind of flat, narrow-minded, stupid humor I've ever had to watch. Everything in this movie (except the one second of genuine humor involving a cat) is predictable, boring, and not even remotely funny. A typical scene: Wife (to husband): "I have a lover.". Cut. Closeup to wife's face with a black eye. Cool humor, huh? Not. The acting ranges from acceptable to the deepest "daily soap" level, but I guess even good actors wouldn't stand a chance against a script like this. Of the 5000 seconds of my life this movie has stolen I enjoyed one, had to smile for three others, and was bored, annoyed and offended by the other 4996. And I thought "Repossessed" was bad comedy. I had no idea...
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