"Neue Adresse Paradies" is a German television film from 2013, so not that long anymore until this movie has its tenth anniversary and maybe, if you need a little longer to shhow up here, and read my review, it happened already. This is not an ARD production, but got made by ZDF, which means the chance is a bit lower that it will be shown really often in the future because of ARD's many small channels, but it was on today and it probably will be for at least another five years, maybe even ten. Of course, the fact that there are fewer channels (no RBB, MDR, HR etc.) that could show this film is made up for by the fact that there is no competition for this film to be shown from thos uncountable ARD Degeto productions. Anyway, the director here is Peter Stauch. He started his career with quite a few films, but in the 2010s, it is a bit of an exception because there he already focused almost exclusively on series. These would be Der letzte Bulle, several SOKO series and Utta Danella adaptations, so as a consequence the quality you can expect with this film here is really low. His early films were not exactly good either gently-speaking. His body of work is probably still better than the one by writer Marie-Helene Schwedler whose "greatest" achievements include Frauenherzen, Marienhof and most recently over hundred episodes of Sturm der Liebe. Can only shake my head at that. Utter absence of creativity here, but hey our GEZ money still feeds her bank account I suppose. So yeah, this film here is doomed for failure from the very start of its under 90 minutes. There may be no Ddegeto involved here, but the outcome is still as bad as it gets. Later on, I will mention crucial weaknesses.
On the poster, you can see the family at the center of the story. The man in the middle is Martin Brambach of course. Him I always like and I doubt this is ever gonna change. At least he plays a central character, which takes maybe one "very" away from saying that this is a very, very, very, very, very bad film. Extremely experienced actor and so much better than the material. I may be biased there because I like him, but only to some extent. For example, nobody can deny that he is better than Dana Golombek, the one you see on the right. Or see partially only. Over 200 Rote Rosen episodes speak for themselves. So do In aller Freundschaft, Rosamunde Pilcher and SOKO again. By the way, with her it was a bit of back to the roots as she starred very early in her career on Die Camper and that show I liked quite a bit, but not because of her, but because of lead actor Willy Thomczyk, who also became a victim of the #metoo movement. But that's another story. Golombek is simply not a good actress, so she fits in here nicely given the screenplay. On the left is Leonie Tepe. Not too much to say about her. Saw her on other stuff and she is mildly attractive, but don't see much range or versatility either with her. She plays of course the couple's daughter. Or actually only the woman's daughter. But there for example Brambach also had a decent moment when towards the end he says that he will be a father for her if she wants him to, even if the part with the development into a beautiful young woman was a bit much. But it probably would have been even worse with other actors saying these lines. There are other pretty experienced actors here like von Quast, Wink and Gulp. Not gonna go much into detail about those, but feel free to check out their bodies of work if you care. Also many pretty stunning women in here with Gollmer, Bolik and Kurbanova.
Now let's take a look at the story. This is about a family that can no longer pay the bills, so the only option they have is move out and live inside their caravan on the camping ground. The key reason for that were the husband's bad ways in handling money. Pretty simple background honestly, but I am not surprised this film is also taking an anti-male stance as it is always the case with Degeto. There are also implications on some occasions that he struggles with burn-out symptoms, but this was especially pathetic because a subject like that should be either elaborated on properly or left out entirely. The way they handled it here, it felt all for the sake of it and this is really offensive almost to people actually struggling from this illness. A key flaw to this film. There are many others. The fact that the daughter somehow tells us this story was meant in a creative way, but adds nothing all. We basically forget about it until we are in the now again. I can go on with the daughter. Her story was really poor. Her intention to go to her grandma still made sense, but how quickly she started dating the boy from the camping ground after initially not being one bit interested made no sense. As for the story how she is scared to be judged that her parents are getting money from the unemployment agency now, it made sense, but only in theory. The way it was actually depicted with her potentially losing her best friend was nothing but pseudo drama. The story with the ring at the end and how it got solved out of nowhere with the music blasting was downright embarrassing. Happy endings galore. Let's forget about authenticity to please the simple-minded. Moving on to the grown-ups, let me say that Brambach had two really nice moments here: The first would be when he is on the phone and lies that he is in Spain and I am talking about the guy cleaning the beach there. The second would be when he recites that line about a light (positive thing) coming out of nowhere when needed. That was hilarious. The inclusion of the beaver in the end that happens when another characters says something like that too was more closure for the sake of it and nothing else, even if the animal was cute.
That guy I just mentioned had another line before that where he said that he'd rather drink himself to death than leave the location. This was a moment where the humor was a bit politically incorrect and I liked it. Sadly, this was pretty much the only one. Almost everything else was failure territory and this refers especially to the story of the main antagonist, a guy who wants to chase the campers away. Of course, what a coincidence, he is also the male protagonist's boss and the big drama at the end includes that said protagonist (Brambach) collaborated with the enemy and is ousted and even has to fear for his wife to leave him. Which of course is not happening. But again, the men are the fools and antagonists. Shallow female characters like the female protagonist's mother or potentially shallow friends to the daughter are in there, but have either no screen time or are all of a sudden really understanding after being insulted like the elderly woman. Made no sense to me her reaction somehow. More unauthentic closure. Another very uninspired running gag almost (even if unintentional) was how so many characters show up randomly on the camping ground. Take Golombek's former lover, who was not only not good enough for her back then, but is also a minor antagonist at times when he disagrees with Brambach's proposition. This is how the film elaborated on the rivalry between the two men when it comes to being with Golombek's stunning character. Sigh. Or how the two fellow students show up, those friends (or "friends") of Tepe's character. Or how Brambach's boss of course has some unfinished business with exactly this cammping ground and he shows up to. Man, they cannot be serious with that. Not sure what is more embarrassing: That this even got made and released or that it is still shown to many years later. Probably the best answer is that it got financed through everybody's GEZ money and even those who do not care about stuff like that and don't watch it are forced to pay for it.
Finally, also Brambach was not a revelation in here of course. He also had his really poor moments and you can always blame him for accepting to play the part and cash in. One would be the fake tan. Another would be when he talks about the love for his wife. This was meant in a deep, in a touching, in an emotional way, but it just felt false like almost everything else from this movie. Or the scene he shares with this chubby women when he talks about her looks or something and compliments her. Or the boss and his assistant talking about upcoming elections. So yeah, there are at least (half) a dozen other moments I could quote and talk about here because they deserve elaboration on how bad they were and why they were this bad honestly. The truth is just that this was a pretty unwatchable movie and all the life lessons depicted in here (including topless male teenagers) felt fake and as unauthentic as it gets and this is really always the worst, when you feel that the film takes itself 100% (or 99%) seriously, but it just has no right to because the execution is so shoddy and the talent simply isn't there with the filmmakers. Take the scene in the end when we see the two protagonists hugging again, when we see the two girlfriends being reunited again with their rings and at the same time we hear this really loud music and for Schwedler, this was a key sequence in which everything gets solved, everybody is happy again and so shall be the audience because let's forget about how all was messed-up a couple minutes earlier. But this is of course not a problem with this film only, but with many other movies too. I guess that is it then. This film gets the lowest possible rating from me and I highly recommend skipping the watch here. The use of music was also nothing to be proud of at all as I hinted at earlier already. The songs may be alright, but the specific scenes they are used for really drag down the music as well. It just made no sense at all, also how early on they are really not liked by the locals, but quickly they are close friends with everybody and the woman is even representing them during this bizarre meeting there between the two spouses. All messed-up.
On the poster, you can see the family at the center of the story. The man in the middle is Martin Brambach of course. Him I always like and I doubt this is ever gonna change. At least he plays a central character, which takes maybe one "very" away from saying that this is a very, very, very, very, very bad film. Extremely experienced actor and so much better than the material. I may be biased there because I like him, but only to some extent. For example, nobody can deny that he is better than Dana Golombek, the one you see on the right. Or see partially only. Over 200 Rote Rosen episodes speak for themselves. So do In aller Freundschaft, Rosamunde Pilcher and SOKO again. By the way, with her it was a bit of back to the roots as she starred very early in her career on Die Camper and that show I liked quite a bit, but not because of her, but because of lead actor Willy Thomczyk, who also became a victim of the #metoo movement. But that's another story. Golombek is simply not a good actress, so she fits in here nicely given the screenplay. On the left is Leonie Tepe. Not too much to say about her. Saw her on other stuff and she is mildly attractive, but don't see much range or versatility either with her. She plays of course the couple's daughter. Or actually only the woman's daughter. But there for example Brambach also had a decent moment when towards the end he says that he will be a father for her if she wants him to, even if the part with the development into a beautiful young woman was a bit much. But it probably would have been even worse with other actors saying these lines. There are other pretty experienced actors here like von Quast, Wink and Gulp. Not gonna go much into detail about those, but feel free to check out their bodies of work if you care. Also many pretty stunning women in here with Gollmer, Bolik and Kurbanova.
Now let's take a look at the story. This is about a family that can no longer pay the bills, so the only option they have is move out and live inside their caravan on the camping ground. The key reason for that were the husband's bad ways in handling money. Pretty simple background honestly, but I am not surprised this film is also taking an anti-male stance as it is always the case with Degeto. There are also implications on some occasions that he struggles with burn-out symptoms, but this was especially pathetic because a subject like that should be either elaborated on properly or left out entirely. The way they handled it here, it felt all for the sake of it and this is really offensive almost to people actually struggling from this illness. A key flaw to this film. There are many others. The fact that the daughter somehow tells us this story was meant in a creative way, but adds nothing all. We basically forget about it until we are in the now again. I can go on with the daughter. Her story was really poor. Her intention to go to her grandma still made sense, but how quickly she started dating the boy from the camping ground after initially not being one bit interested made no sense. As for the story how she is scared to be judged that her parents are getting money from the unemployment agency now, it made sense, but only in theory. The way it was actually depicted with her potentially losing her best friend was nothing but pseudo drama. The story with the ring at the end and how it got solved out of nowhere with the music blasting was downright embarrassing. Happy endings galore. Let's forget about authenticity to please the simple-minded. Moving on to the grown-ups, let me say that Brambach had two really nice moments here: The first would be when he is on the phone and lies that he is in Spain and I am talking about the guy cleaning the beach there. The second would be when he recites that line about a light (positive thing) coming out of nowhere when needed. That was hilarious. The inclusion of the beaver in the end that happens when another characters says something like that too was more closure for the sake of it and nothing else, even if the animal was cute.
That guy I just mentioned had another line before that where he said that he'd rather drink himself to death than leave the location. This was a moment where the humor was a bit politically incorrect and I liked it. Sadly, this was pretty much the only one. Almost everything else was failure territory and this refers especially to the story of the main antagonist, a guy who wants to chase the campers away. Of course, what a coincidence, he is also the male protagonist's boss and the big drama at the end includes that said protagonist (Brambach) collaborated with the enemy and is ousted and even has to fear for his wife to leave him. Which of course is not happening. But again, the men are the fools and antagonists. Shallow female characters like the female protagonist's mother or potentially shallow friends to the daughter are in there, but have either no screen time or are all of a sudden really understanding after being insulted like the elderly woman. Made no sense to me her reaction somehow. More unauthentic closure. Another very uninspired running gag almost (even if unintentional) was how so many characters show up randomly on the camping ground. Take Golombek's former lover, who was not only not good enough for her back then, but is also a minor antagonist at times when he disagrees with Brambach's proposition. This is how the film elaborated on the rivalry between the two men when it comes to being with Golombek's stunning character. Sigh. Or how the two fellow students show up, those friends (or "friends") of Tepe's character. Or how Brambach's boss of course has some unfinished business with exactly this cammping ground and he shows up to. Man, they cannot be serious with that. Not sure what is more embarrassing: That this even got made and released or that it is still shown to many years later. Probably the best answer is that it got financed through everybody's GEZ money and even those who do not care about stuff like that and don't watch it are forced to pay for it.
Finally, also Brambach was not a revelation in here of course. He also had his really poor moments and you can always blame him for accepting to play the part and cash in. One would be the fake tan. Another would be when he talks about the love for his wife. This was meant in a deep, in a touching, in an emotional way, but it just felt false like almost everything else from this movie. Or the scene he shares with this chubby women when he talks about her looks or something and compliments her. Or the boss and his assistant talking about upcoming elections. So yeah, there are at least (half) a dozen other moments I could quote and talk about here because they deserve elaboration on how bad they were and why they were this bad honestly. The truth is just that this was a pretty unwatchable movie and all the life lessons depicted in here (including topless male teenagers) felt fake and as unauthentic as it gets and this is really always the worst, when you feel that the film takes itself 100% (or 99%) seriously, but it just has no right to because the execution is so shoddy and the talent simply isn't there with the filmmakers. Take the scene in the end when we see the two protagonists hugging again, when we see the two girlfriends being reunited again with their rings and at the same time we hear this really loud music and for Schwedler, this was a key sequence in which everything gets solved, everybody is happy again and so shall be the audience because let's forget about how all was messed-up a couple minutes earlier. But this is of course not a problem with this film only, but with many other movies too. I guess that is it then. This film gets the lowest possible rating from me and I highly recommend skipping the watch here. The use of music was also nothing to be proud of at all as I hinted at earlier already. The songs may be alright, but the specific scenes they are used for really drag down the music as well. It just made no sense at all, also how early on they are really not liked by the locals, but quickly they are close friends with everybody and the woman is even representing them during this bizarre meeting there between the two spouses. All messed-up.
