Opening 10 Oct 2024
Directed by:
Ngo The Chau
Writing credits:
Carsten Sebastian Henn, Andi Rogenhagen
Principal actors:
Christoph Maria Herbst, Yuna Bennett, Ronald Zehrfeld, Maren Kroymann, Edin Hasanovic
All the lonely people. Where do they all belong? As it turns out, they belong together. Carl Kollhoff (Christoph Maria Herbst) is a lonely elderly man who values his job delivering books to people at home. For various reasons, his regular customers are people who have pretty much retired to lonely lives within their homes and live through the books Carl brings them. Then, nine-year-old Schascha (Yuna Bennett), who’s lonely in her own way, decides to accompany Carl on his rounds, much to his annoyance. With Schascha leading the way, they charge into the lives of his clients much as Schascha charged into Carl’s. There are some obstacles along the way, but, ultimately, they all end up with enriched lives and certainly less lonely. It’s a fine metaphor for embracing change instead of letting it destroy you.
As always, when a movie is adapted from a book, it’s hard not to make comparisons as stories are not as fully flushed out as in the book. That is also true here and some stories weren’t included at all. But they were ultimately revealed, and the essence of the book was certainly portrayed. In retrospect, some of the changes were quite nice. There are laughter, tears, anger, and joy. In my opinion, movies that provide a gamut of emotions are the ones worth seeing. (Anne Crocker)
