This is a tender, generous movie that likes its characters and presents them as real people, full of flaws and strengths.

A lot of perfectly good film show their cards early, establish a unique premise and let the audience explore a topic at a leisurely pace, without much in terms of surprise. this film is not one of those films.

It's easily one of the freshest, sharpest and most enjoyable films of this year.

Like the great film, it's made with a great deal of visible affection both in front of and behind the camera.

"Bibi Blocksberg" is a German 100-minute movie from 2002, so this one has its 15th anniversary this year already. It was directed by Hermine Huntgeburth, one of Germany's most known female filmmakers, and the script is by Elfie Donnelly, actually the one who invented the Bibi Blocksberg character a long time ago. Everybody here in Germany knows her really, even today so so many years after the cassettes etc. original came out. This of course also has to do with Detlev Buck's recent films about the little which, even if these are really only very vaguely based on the Bibi Blocksberg character. But back to this one here. this is the first of two films starring child actress Sidonie von Krosigk as Bibi and looking at her body of work it seems she has stopped acting now. The fact that kids films were already incredibly popular back then is also easy to see with the names Riemann, Noethen, Harfouch and maybe also Hain in the cast. Harfouch (playing the main antagonist) even won a German Film Award for her performance here and while I like her as an actress I am not too sure how much of the character was really great performing and how much was costume and makeup. Anyway, the movie was also nominated for Youth Film of the Year, but lost out to a modern version of "Das fliegende Klassenzimmer". Saw that one as well and I think Bibi is better and should have won.So yeah, the story here is basically about Bibi being introduced to the circle of witches very early thanks to great achievements and this upsets another witch who even has to give her magic glass ball to Bibi. Also there is a lot of talk and action about the equivalent to a fountain of youth in here. And the major conflict is about witchcraft vs. no witchcraft as Bibi's dad is of course a normal human, which also brings some solid comedy. I also think the comedy here is the best aspect about the film. Every time it got a bit dramatic, like the missing money or ability to perform witchcraft taken away from Bibi's mother is when the movie is not exactly at its best. Still I think Riemann was somewhat bearable in here despite occasional overacting as usual and I am not a fan of her at all. The music was so-so. Not bad, but also the songs weren't really catchy. This film is for everybody who wants their Bibi close to the audio cassettes and not as a youth film that almost exists on his own (Buck's approach). But the latter has Tina and horses in it after all, while this one here really almost entirely focuses on the concept of witchcraft. There are reasons why one is better than the other and the other way around. Eventually, it all comes down to subjective taste I think. I myself enjoyed the watch here and I think back then when Harry Potter was really trending hard we also have a decent film on a similar subject from Germany. Go check it out.

This movie, shot in 2002, seems strongly inspired by the success of Harry Potter - for example when Rabia, the evil witch, says that young witches who live like "normal" people shouldn't get a crystal bowl. But in contrast to the Harry Potter books and movies the witches in Bibi's world are well-known to normal people and are shown on the first page of the local newspaper.But it is not right to say that Bibi Blocksberg is a Harry Potter copy. She was invented by Elfie Donnelly in the 1970s (?) and had a high success on cassettes, in comics and cartoons a long time before the rise of Harry Potter. It is very good that Elfie Donnelly wrote the script of the movie herself, so that no one else could destroy Bibi's world.Besides the young actors like Sidonie von Krosigk and Maximilian Befort famous German actors like Katja Riemann, Ulrich Noethen, Corinna Harfouch and Monika Bleibtreu make this movie worth seeing.In fact, Germany tried to remember his own magicians after the Harry Potter hype and made a worth seeing wizard movie for families.