Talking to a movie-loving friend about a recent German film, I talked about one of the comedies that had been successful at the German box office, Welcome to the Hartmanns. My friend asked me, "Are there comedy movies in Germany?" "Of course there is, last year in Cannes, which received praise from film critics and received the highest score from the screen magazine Screen, was the German comedy film Tony Erdmann. But as I mentioned in an interview about "comedy movies," Tony Erdman is a comedy with tears in its laughter.
"Welcome to the Hartmans" is, of course, a comedy, at least it is more pure than "Tony Erdman", just to make the audience laugh. However, unlike comedy films, as a qualified comedy film, it makes the audience laugh freely, but it has a very profound social reality significance. I believe that's why it was a box office success in 2016. Because it involves the "refugee genre".
There is nothing more resonant to the German public than this subject, which is somewhat similar to the nationalist sentiment evoked by the Chinese film Wolf Warrior 2. This is a tipping point for a social phenomenon. While facing a mid-life marital crisis, a wife Angelica spends her retirement time volunteering to focus on and help refugees, which eventually develops to take a refugee home despite the objections of her husband Dr. Hartmann and her son, Philippa, a lawyer. So Diallo from Nigeria became the lucky one. But trouble ensued... But in the end, all family conflicts also disappeared in this crisis of hosting refugees.
In the setting of the comedy bridge, screenwriter and director Simon Van Hoewen is qualified. Not only is diallo's involvement in the threat of invisible conflict (suspicion) between the Hartmans, but philippa's over-pursuit of career and neglect of his children has led to the repeated troubles of troubled teenagers; and the open struggle between people around him for the internment activity into very different camps; and Diallo's own special experience and identity have also given him a strong comedic contrast to the discord in this Middle-Class German family. But this overly facial character design and Diallo's miraculous cure of all the family conflicts of this middle-class family has left the audience with what should have been profound enough to cause the audience to reflect on the reality of society after laughing. Diallo's kindness and innocence, as well as the suffering of his family and the death of a man, seem to have become a "panacea" to save Germany's reality, enough to cure all the difficult diseases faced by Germany, which has led to severe social divisions caused by the excessive admission of refugees.
Although the director does not reject and deny that there are also black sheep among the refugees who attempt to fool through the barriers and create a terrorist attack, the film's depiction of mentally handicapped terrorists and the slightly stupid satire of the secret police do not add much comedy to the film. On the contrary, it seems too pretentious and deliberate. I suddenly remembered the question my friend had asked: Is there a comedy in Germany? The director makes a choice between deep and superficial, so it is clear that for some people, this kind of comedy film is less comedic. It's a high-grossing German film of 2016, but few people think of inviting a refugee to live in their home after watching the film, although Diallo is friendly enough to offer to live in the basement.
The question remains in front of all Germans, "Would you invite a refugee to live with you?" After the box office, most people will still be like Hartman's neighbors: refugees are not allowed to enter this place. Rather than comedies like this, I would prefer something more like French director Philippe Riorère's 2009 film Illegal Entry. Like Welcome to the Hartmans, they have a title called Welcome.
Living in Denmark, he is a deep fan of film, who has represented NetEase, Sina and Tencent in the Cannes and Venice Film Festivals, and has also provided film manuscripts for many domestic media magazines.