"Alles Chefsache!" is a German television film from 2013, so this one is also getting closer to its tenth anniversary and, who knows, maybe it happened already deppending on when you read this review of mine. I shall start with the basics for this one: It runs for 1.5 hours, minimally under, just like the vast majority of German small screen releases. The director is Edzard Onneken, who has been working for over 30 years now in the industry as a filmmaker, back then easily over 20 years, so certainly very much on the experienced side. He was born in Pakistan, but has never really worked on anything else than German-language projects. However, the fact that he launches his career with GZSZ and that his most known project is maybe "Türkisch für Anfänger" is pretty telling in terms of what you can expect here quality-wise. He was only around the age of 25 or even younger when he started back then and now he is between 50 and 60. He has never been a director really who wrote his own screenplays, so it shall not come as a surprise to anybody that he was not in charge of the writing here either. Instead, they got two people for that: Hause is definitely the more experienced from the duo, the one with a much bigger body of work, even if apparently Gebhart started earlier, even back in the old millennium. Well, what can you say about their bodies of work? They could be worse for sure I would say, but also they are not horribly bad, so I guess the outcome here is a definite contender for career-worse for both of them. However, as for Hause, films like "Erdbeereis mit Liebe" ("Strawberry ice cream with love") and "Griechische Küsse" ("Greek kisses") are definite contenders as well as you can already guess from the titles. I think this one here is a really bad film, but I probably would have hated it even more with somebody else like Halmer in the lead. Honestly, he has been in so any abysmal ARD Degeto productions that I should really despise him by now and also he has not acted very well in most of those, but somehow I have a soft spot for him. I still find it sad that, at the age of 70, he had to appear in films like this one here because he is a man who has played in two Oscar-winning films, even if that was a long time ago, but still. One of them was even one of the biggest winners in Oscar history. And he did not play characters that were on the screen for five seconds or so, but considerably longer. Oh well, after all he made the choices to star in films like this one here himself, so I should not go too easy on him either I suppose. Still a bit strange to see him with ginger hair in here, but I guess he had to look a little younger, so his romance story would not feel too absurd because the female actress was a lot younger. Still is. The most known cast members here are definitely the males. We have Helmut Zierl, who plays the main villain, which the trained eye recognizes immediately from the poor writing, and the guy you see on the photo here on imdb next to Halmer is David Rott, an actor that most German film buffs have come across too I guess. Don't wanna say too much about the females here, simply because I don't know the actresses, but one that deserves a mention is Angela Roy. Not for positive reasons though. She played an Italian in here and I have no idea what they were thinking, but what she displayed there, was definitely not an Italian accent. Like not even close. Ridiculous and this says everything about the production values and absence of talent here. But what would you expect from somebody whose career-defining works include Inga Lindström movies, Rosamunde Pilcher adaptations and "Rote Rosen". Can only shake my head at somebody like this playing a key character in a movie that is not just on national television, but an ARD production. Your GEZ money at work, folks.
Okay, now I shall elaborate on a few scenes and inclusions from this film to make myself clear why I thought this was a terrible watch altogether. It is once more the usual issues with ARD Degeto. The biggest is probably that way too much happens here from beginning to end. Let's recollect: We have a man being forced to go into retirement. We have his son take over the company. We have another company ready to buy said company. We have a last-minute switch that saves the company. We have a female character finding out she is pregnant. We have said character collapse out of nowhere. We have the older male protagonist throw up from food. This is probably not even everything. It's just ridiculous. These films always have more action than most people see in five or ten years of time. Oh and let's not forget about the suicide attempt early on. Honestly, this was depicted and included in such a cringeworthy manner that I felt they were literally making fun of people that are actually suicidal. It may sound harsh, but subjects like these need to be touched with a great deal of sensitivity and the talent and right approach for something like this is entirely absent here. Can only shake my head at that. And let's not even get started on the absurd rescue mission from the female protagonist there with her bike and how her face expression in the end shows us she knew exactly what was going on here. But it's no surprise. The females in these movies are always the smart ones because these films are mostly for female audiences. Often, they are anti-male as well. I guess you could say that here too from several perspectives, for example how the "Italian" pushes around Halmer's character constantly and yet the latter is the bad guy with how he acts in that restaurant. Oh yes, as for the restaurant (or café), the guy sitting there and sharing his wisdom with Halmer's character is one who turns out to be a bank manager and boom in the end, they simply employ him. Another mesmerizing coincidence. Also that he agrees. Ridiculous again. What else can I say? A yes, the anti-male component. Take a look at how the Italian woman, a complete stranger in fact, finds out first about the pregnancy. It is not her man that she tells how it should be. It is also not Halmer's character who takes her to the hospital after she collapses. No. It is the woman that she becomes best friends with within seconds after her tear-filled collapse and meltdown. No words for that again. Literally, no matter what perspective you are taking here, this film is such a failure from pretty much every perspective honestly. Oh and by the way, this is about soup, not necessarily noodle soup, but soup in general. Just saying because you could have forgotten already by the end because this is where they reintroduce this aspect again after leaving it out for pretty much the entire film before that except the very start. But it could have been really about every other item too in terms of the family business. The father-son reunion at the end when he says something caring to his son also feels really forced. Another issue with these films is that they indeed always have the utmost happy ending. I don't even want to mention everything now that goes right here after it all seemed to have gone wrong 20 minutes earlier, maybe 15 only, but trust me there is a lot and it makes absolutely no sense from a perspective of authenticity. No other option for me here than giving this movie a thumbs-down. A massive one indeed. Just take a look at how she initially did not even know she was pregnant, but then has massive symptoms immediately afterwards when she is eating with her man. Yep, the man who dares to accept the phone while at a beauty spa or something with his significant other. Boo! I hope you get the irony. The only real boo goes out to people who were part of the making of this movie. And to those who actually saw the slightest bit of quality in here. Everybody else who saw through this charade I am glad to know they do, especially the females. I applaud them. Go watch something else instead.
Okay, now I shall elaborate on a few scenes and inclusions from this film to make myself clear why I thought this was a terrible watch altogether. It is once more the usual issues with ARD Degeto. The biggest is probably that way too much happens here from beginning to end. Let's recollect: We have a man being forced to go into retirement. We have his son take over the company. We have another company ready to buy said company. We have a last-minute switch that saves the company. We have a female character finding out she is pregnant. We have said character collapse out of nowhere. We have the older male protagonist throw up from food. This is probably not even everything. It's just ridiculous. These films always have more action than most people see in five or ten years of time. Oh and let's not forget about the suicide attempt early on. Honestly, this was depicted and included in such a cringeworthy manner that I felt they were literally making fun of people that are actually suicidal. It may sound harsh, but subjects like these need to be touched with a great deal of sensitivity and the talent and right approach for something like this is entirely absent here. Can only shake my head at that. And let's not even get started on the absurd rescue mission from the female protagonist there with her bike and how her face expression in the end shows us she knew exactly what was going on here. But it's no surprise. The females in these movies are always the smart ones because these films are mostly for female audiences. Often, they are anti-male as well. I guess you could say that here too from several perspectives, for example how the "Italian" pushes around Halmer's character constantly and yet the latter is the bad guy with how he acts in that restaurant. Oh yes, as for the restaurant (or café), the guy sitting there and sharing his wisdom with Halmer's character is one who turns out to be a bank manager and boom in the end, they simply employ him. Another mesmerizing coincidence. Also that he agrees. Ridiculous again. What else can I say? A yes, the anti-male component. Take a look at how the Italian woman, a complete stranger in fact, finds out first about the pregnancy. It is not her man that she tells how it should be. It is also not Halmer's character who takes her to the hospital after she collapses. No. It is the woman that she becomes best friends with within seconds after her tear-filled collapse and meltdown. No words for that again. Literally, no matter what perspective you are taking here, this film is such a failure from pretty much every perspective honestly. Oh and by the way, this is about soup, not necessarily noodle soup, but soup in general. Just saying because you could have forgotten already by the end because this is where they reintroduce this aspect again after leaving it out for pretty much the entire film before that except the very start. But it could have been really about every other item too in terms of the family business. The father-son reunion at the end when he says something caring to his son also feels really forced. Another issue with these films is that they indeed always have the utmost happy ending. I don't even want to mention everything now that goes right here after it all seemed to have gone wrong 20 minutes earlier, maybe 15 only, but trust me there is a lot and it makes absolutely no sense from a perspective of authenticity. No other option for me here than giving this movie a thumbs-down. A massive one indeed. Just take a look at how she initially did not even know she was pregnant, but then has massive symptoms immediately afterwards when she is eating with her man. Yep, the man who dares to accept the phone while at a beauty spa or something with his significant other. Boo! I hope you get the irony. The only real boo goes out to people who were part of the making of this movie. And to those who actually saw the slightest bit of quality in here. Everybody else who saw through this charade I am glad to know they do, especially the females. I applaud them. Go watch something else instead.
