René Marik is one of the most famous German puppeteers and comedians. After entertaining audiences for years with his mole, polar bear and frog puppets, he's finally made his first movie. And here, it's all about the puppets again. The main comedic aspect is they look like puppets, but if you didn't see them, judging from their dialogs and actions, you could easily mistake them for humans.
There's also humans in this film, but the center are clearly the puppets, mostly voiced by writer-director René Marik himself. In the center there's a group of rather unsuccessful theater actors who can't come up with the rent anymore, so they decide to abduct the star puppet from another theater and release him for a huge sum of money. Obviously things don't go as planned in the slightest.
My main motivation to watch this film was Christoph Maria Herbst. He has the central role in the German version of The Office which I'm a great fan of. His comedic timing is usually brilliant, which doesn't help as he plays a ruthless criminal without the slightest ounce of humor in this one. Still I felt he gave the best performance from the whole cast.
Another thing that needs to be said is that this is not suitable for children at all. Lots of violence and profanity are included from start to finish. I respect Marik and his decision to adapt his show for the big screen and I'm sure those who donated to this movie, which was financed considerably via crowd-funding, had a great time watching, but sadly I thought it looked really amateurish in large parts and the story simply wasn't compelling enough. The one thing I can't deny it, however, is definitely that the whole premise and execution is truly unique.
There's also humans in this film, but the center are clearly the puppets, mostly voiced by writer-director René Marik himself. In the center there's a group of rather unsuccessful theater actors who can't come up with the rent anymore, so they decide to abduct the star puppet from another theater and release him for a huge sum of money. Obviously things don't go as planned in the slightest.
My main motivation to watch this film was Christoph Maria Herbst. He has the central role in the German version of The Office which I'm a great fan of. His comedic timing is usually brilliant, which doesn't help as he plays a ruthless criminal without the slightest ounce of humor in this one. Still I felt he gave the best performance from the whole cast.
Another thing that needs to be said is that this is not suitable for children at all. Lots of violence and profanity are included from start to finish. I respect Marik and his decision to adapt his show for the big screen and I'm sure those who donated to this movie, which was financed considerably via crowd-funding, had a great time watching, but sadly I thought it looked really amateurish in large parts and the story simply wasn't compelling enough. The one thing I can't deny it, however, is definitely that the whole premise and execution is truly unique.