Even someone with as little experience in front of the camera as Batbileg is strong here, with the 13-year-old getting his character’s tricky mix of outward daring and bravura and insecure, inner teenage boy just right. This shock tactic of sorts could have been used more often both musically and visually, as quite a few of the choices in these areas are otherwise not quite predictable but still rather on the safe side.Īkin does again demonstrate that he’s a solid director of actors. ![]() Given the content of the film, along with the language, and behavior of the lead characters,Tschick would likely receive a PG-13 rating in America with parents. Reading the descriptions of this film by its makers and reviewers in Germany brings out the real dichotomy of what is considered family material in Europe as opposed to America. Repeated use of Richard Clayderman’s romantic piano ballad Ballade pour Adeline, to accompany the boys on their trip, represents an unexpected counterpoint on the soundtrack. Maik, Isa, and Tschick are drying out on the pier. But more transcendent moments like this in which the images take on an added meaning are (too) few and far between. The moment is soberly staged and completely asexual, turning the simple act of washing themselves into a ritual cleansing of sorts. It involves Maik, Tschick and a teenage girl called Isa (Nicole Mercedes Mueller, playing a character that was also the protagonist in Herrndorf’s unfinished last novel) getting into a lake to lather themselves up with soap after what must have been days on the road without showers. There’s one other moment that has a touch of poetry as well. But the result of this choice is that the impact of the revelation isn’t quite powerful enough to make audiences race back to several earlier moments in the film that take on a somewhat different meaning in hindsight, with the Russian outcast’s cool confidence with even the hottest girls, for example, now making a lot more sense for a rather unexpected reason. Akin and the actors play the moment in the most understated way possible, which is both effective and affecting. This becomes painstakingly clear in what is, ironically, one of the best and most touching moments in the film, when Tschick has hurt his foot and confesses something to Maik he’s never told anyone. But we’re mostly experiencing him from Maik’s limited vantage point, and we’re not privy to a lot of what he’s thinking. The film doesn’t have a lot of voiceover, however, which is an occasionally frustrating solution since the title character is such a fascinating one. Herrndorf’s novel is an update of the classic story of youngsters trying to make it on their own without their parents, a la Lord of the Flies and Huckleberry Finn, and is told from the restrictive point of view of its protagonist, Maik. Their initial idea is to use the car to impress Tatjana but around the half-hour mark, they find themselves on the road with a vague couple of ideas of where to go and what to do. Case in point: the blue Lada he shows up in on Maik’s doorstep and that he says he “borrows” occasionally. And besides the I-don’t-give-a-damn coolness factor, he also reeks of alcohol and seems to have access to things normally only reserved for adults. ![]() ![]() She’s throwing a fancy birthday party to which practically everyone is invited - except for Maik and the weirdo sitting next to him, the new-in-town Andrej ‘Tschick’ Tschichatschow (Munich-born Anand Batbileg, of Mongolian extraction), from a German-speaking minority in Russia.Īndrej, a mostly silent, I-don’t-bite-as-long-as-you-don’t-come-near-me kind of loner, certainly stands out in his cargo pants and Hawaiian shirts. So begins a wild adventure where the two experience the trip of a lifetime and share a summer that they will never forget.Maik (Tristan Gobel) is a long-haired and aloof 14-year-old with a crush on the hottest girl in his class, Tatjana (Aniya Wendel). ![]() Tschick, a Russian immigrant and an outcast, steals a car and decides to set off on a journey away from Berlin with Maik tagging along for the ride. Die Reise wird zu einer Irrfahrt mit vielen lustigen, seltsamen und ungewöhnlichen Ereignissen. While his mother is in rehab and his father is on a 'business trip' with his assistant, 14-year-old outsider Maik (Tristan Göbel) is spending the summer holidays bored and alone at his parents' villa, when rebellious teenager Tschick (Anand Batbileg) appears. Die beiden Achtklässler Maik Klingenberg und Andrej Tschichatschow, kurz Tschick, fahren in den Sommerferien in einem alten, von Tschick geliehenen Lada in die Walachei.
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