User Reviews

"Sonnenstich" or "Sunstroke" is an Austrian German-language live action short film from 2004, so this one is already over 15 years old. This was written and directed by Matthias Greuling and Lydia Zemann. The latter never worked on another movie before or after this one, but the former had a doocumentary released not too long ago, but still not a prolific career by any definition. Things went better for the cast members here. The younger actress has not been in a new project (according to imdb) for almost a decade now, but the other two are still enjoying solid careers to this day. As for the plot, the general situation is that we have a young couple go on a holiday with the female's mother, but things take a turn for the awkward quickly when we (and the young woman) watch the boyfriend receive oral pleasure from the mother. It's so bizarre that it feels difficult to believe, but then again we saw it. First I thought that the title was a bad choice because it could be a spoiler that this act did not happen in reality, but then I thought that maybe it actually did happen and the two filmmakers are just toying with us. If you don't want to know which is the case, you should stop reading here. The young woman (pretty stunning Martina Schwab, shame we don't get a sex scene from her) is really skeptical and pretends to go shopping, but returns immediately to see what is going on. And they are at it again, now 100% and not just mouth. The fact that she does not interrupt the two to see how they react also implies that it is not real. When at the end we see that the young man is pretty careful when bringing the towel to his girlfriend's mother, we realize that it was all just in the girl's head. But that is really her smalles problem at that point. I must say the revelation at the end was okay and how they included it, but the fact that the girl died all of a sudden while she was in the swimming pool felt a bit exaggerated for drama purposes to me. Also what I meant ith the title of my review is that either the man or the mother (they are the two closest to her) should have realized that something is terribly wrong. I mean even if she (inexplicably) has no other symptoms than seeing these situations, then her reaction at the dinner table would have been enough for either of the two check up on her. I still like the idea that it was all just in her mind. I must say that if these events actually happened, it really would have been unrealistic. No offense, but look at the two female characters and tell me why would a guy cheat on this attractive daughter with her mother. Also, let's not completely ignore the idea that the mother may a) not be interested and b) not be interested in ruining her child's love life. So there are good aspects to this movie, also the soundtrack and atmosphere you could feel the heat through the screen, but overall, I still give this pretty slow film (would have fit into 12 instead of 24 minutes) a thumbs-down. It's nowhere near failure territory, has its strong moments (like when she pretends to go shopping, then returns), but for a positive recommendation, something was missing for me. I say skip it, but if you still want to see it, go on Youtube. It's uploaded there with English subtitles, although there are so few spoken lines in here that you almost don't need them. Just make sure you always drink enough water when you are in the sun for a longer period of time.