Very Cool!!!

One of my all time favorites.

The performances transcend the film's tropes, grounding it in characters that feel more complete than this subgenre often produces.

I cannot think of one single thing that I would change about this film. The acting is incomparable, the directing deft, and the writing poignantly brilliant.

"Becks letzter Sommer" is a German movie from 2015, so still relatively new and fresh and this one comes close to the 100-minute mark. After a break of 6 years since his pretty successful first movie, this is Wittich's second full feature film. It is based on a novel by Benedict Wells and this is normally the moment when I say that I have not read the novel and cannot make parallels between book and film. But here I did check out a plot summary and what I saw happened in the book at the very end has nothing to do with how the film ends. And this is the perfect example of what is wrong with German dramedies. The writers are so damn scared of what audiences would think about a non-happy ending that they even adjust books to completely different endings just to make sure everybody leaves the theater in a positive mood. IT is really the perfect cinema equivalent to our German "aussitzen" mentality brought upon us by politics over many years now. It could hardly be more vomit-inducing really.Anyway back to the film here. I have been harsh on Ulmen when it comes to more serious material, but he really nailed the part here and he was very good. Sadly, his co-lead was the exact opposite, which may also be one reason why Ulmen looked so strong in here. Same goes for the other guy who joins them on their trip and also ends up in hospital at the very end. That's all the negativity they had. Who cares about the book? I really wish writers would refuse to have their work adapted if the screen writers make decisions like these. In addition, the title also gives off a terminal illness vibe that was probably intended to lure audiences to theaters hoping for some huge emotion, but these people also consider Matthias Schweighöfer a talented actor, so you can make up your mind yourself about these. So yeah, Ulmen convinced me finally once again, he also made his character and story really work, but sadly the movie and basically everything around him here, especially the more dramatic moments as well as the adaptation as a whole are in shatters and the negative is certainly more frequent than the positive. Skip this one. I give it a thumbs-down.

Christian Ulmen has proved that he has versatility. And he proves it once again in this movie. A tough role especially because he's doing some really "bad" things. But how bad are they? And does his former friend and all those other story lines conflict? Is there enough running time to get everything sorted? And is being morally wrong such a bad thing? Or shouldn't you look out for yourself too? Many questions, maybe not all the answers get served here.One thing is for sure, some people won't like the fact that there are many story lines and different characters with their own problems. Maybe if it had focused more on our main character, it would have done a better job. But this still is a nice movie, because it does barely juggle all the themes and comes out on top of it (or does it?)