A Masterpiece!

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 is a whirlwind of delight --- attractive actors, stunning couture, spectacular sets and outrageous parties.

Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.

Uschi Obermaier is certainly a very controversial character. I thing the best term to describe her would be "society slut". She loved the company of very important or very rich people and if she had enough of one man and sees a chance to be with a more powerful man, she would not hesitate. So, even if I despise the character, I can somewhat see why they would make a film about her and also why this film is actually pretty well-known, also outside of Germany. But that does not mean it's a good movie. The first problem is Natalia Avalon who is neither a good actress nor a good singer and I have no idea why she was cast here. i guess because she is fairly attractive and wasn't scared to show full frontal nudity.The story is not really great either I have to say, but it's not entirely bad either. However, the by far best thing about this 110 minute film is the makeup. They did a really good job on Schweighöfer's character and lets not say he gave a good performance. He certainly did not. All the makeup and Langhans' unique looks did the job on him. And in the end, the makeup on Keuth Richard was spot-on as well. So I am sort-of okay with the 2 German Film Award nominations that this movie received. The writer and director here is Achim Bornhak, but there is nothing more to say about him. Even here in Germany, he is pretty much unknown and this is the only famous film he worked on. Finally, a thumbs-up for Georg Friedrich who plays well as always. But his character was too small to make up for all the negative aspects in this movie. Not recommended.

This is probably the worst of all the terrible German movies I had to watch over the years. If there was an award for stupidity the movie would definitely get it. I don't want even to mention the terrible acting, the cheap set design, the pointless "story" or the idiotic dialog and the overall horrible look which are nowadays standard for German films. What's really bothering is that for some reason the creators seem not to have the slightest idea what the "Kommune" and the whole 68 movement were about, what they wanted and what they did. The movie deals with childish clichés - the scene when Uschi and Rainer meet the Rolling - Stones is so exquisitely ridiculous that you will have trouble to believe your eyes - even if this is somehow true for the whole movie. If Uschi has really coauthored this we're all asking us if he had so many drugs during the time that she probably did not even get what was going on. Otherwise: How could this possibly happen?

Well, I always thought that Germany can't do great movies, but now I know it can! I was surprised that it was so unbelievable good! The story of Uschi Obermaier was filmed excellent. The movie shows the audience the height and depths of Obermaier's life. And to be true, I love Natalia Avelon. She looks like Uschi Obermaier and I think that she is the perfect actress for that role. Her hair style is almost the same (in the movie). I had watched the movie with a friend and she thought it is too sexual she didn't like it, but I did! OK, it would be better if Keith Richards would be played by a English actor but it is okay. I think it is also good that there are parts which are just spoken in English. I love English so I really enjoyed it. The film locations are perfect. I am overwhelmed by that bus in which they drive through the world in six years. Now the acting: Brilliant! Natalia is sexy, what she has to be in that kind of movie. She acts so amazing. She can play funny scenes but also serious ones. Especially in the scene where she looses her baby or where her husband dies she shows us that she can also play sad movies. The music is excellent. I love that song "Summer Wine". Natalia Avelon sings that song herself! Well, I can only say that everybody who likes hot women and excellent movies should go in it.10 of 10 stars!

Just saw this entertaining little flick and can't help but disagree with the first review by Andreas Jacke (which quite frankly doesn't make much sense anyway). Directed by Achim Bornhak, who already proved to be an expert at creating an authentic atmosphere with his feature length debut "Die Nacht der Nächte – School's Out", "Das wilde Leben" most definitely won't go down in the annals of cinematic history as a masterpiece, but still provides 120 minutes of well acted, lovingly decorated and beautifully photographed entertainment. Based on the biography of legendary German starlet Uschi Obermaier who set out to see as much of the world and have as much fun as possible the movie covers a period of approximately 15 years starting with Uschi's arrival in the Kommune 1 in Berlin in the late 60's and ending with the death of her lover and traveling companion Bockhorn in Mexico in 1983.There has been some criticism about "Das wilde Leben" changing its tone quite rapidly after an hour with the beginning of their journey across the world but that's not entirely true. Throughout the first 90 minutes it actually functions neatly as an ironic comedy filled with memorable characters that may mostly not seem particularly likable at first, but that you end up enjoy watching nonetheless. Being able to speak German, however, is a necessity to fully appreciate this movie, since a considerable portion of the humor relies on the variety of dialects that are spoken. Although the cast almost exclusively consists of newcomers they all do an admirable job at bringing their characters to life without ever making the mistake of taking them too seriously. Especially Natalia Avelon shows that she is destined to be one of the new stars of German cinema. Born in Poland and raised in Baden-Württemberg, Germany she also succeeds at handling the specific Bavarian dialect the young Uschi Obermaier used to speak with. Similarly flawless performances come from Matthias Schweighöfer and David Scheller (a very underrated actor) whereas Georg Friedrich and Alexander Scheer provide some occasional comic relief. Starting with Uschi's and Bockhorn's wedding the movie then indeed takes a couple of dramatic turns for its final reels which however didn't distract me in any way. Others are of course free to have a different opinion about that.Tech credits are pro, especially the beautifully designed sets and costumes further enhance the movie's authenticity. For a rather small German production that didn't go the easy way by relying on big stars they obviously had a more than decent budget. That it wasn't enough to obtain the rights for some of the more famous hits of that time gets rather obvious early on, but at least in my opinion it wouldn't be fair to blame the movie for this little shortcoming. Anyone who knows a bit about this kind of stuff is most likely aware of the absurd amounts of money that filmmakers have to pay for every snippet of a song they may or may not want to use. Plus: Both, the songs they ended up with and Alexander Hacke's versatile score support the action excellently. I particularly dig the piece he composed for the demonstration sequence. Natalia Avelon's and Ville Valo's cover version of "Summer Wine" of course isn't half bad, either.Much has also been talked and written about the numerous nude scenes featuring the beautiful Natalia Avelon, although the most explicit and lengthy one actually is provided by Matthias Schweighöfer early in the movie. There also is some quick but pretty damn real looking oral sex featuring Valerie Lasserre and David Scheller but due to the way it's shot they may as well have used a prosthetic. Still, considering that "Das wilde Leben" has been given a FSK12 (the German equivalent of the American PG-13) both males and females definitely get their money's worth in this department.Obviously "Das wilde Leben" isn't a movie for everyone. Although extremely well performed most of the characters don't really have much depth, a storyline in the actual sense of the word doesn't exist and the vast amount of nudity may turn more uptight people off. Still, if you can get past all that you most likely may end up enjoying the ride. I sure did! In fact the entire cinema seemed to have a ball on that evening, especially throughout the first 90 minutes.