Emil and the Detectives (2001)

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Movie
Original title Emil and the detectives
Country of production Germany
original language German
Publishing year 2001
length 111 minutes
Age rating FSK without age restriction
Rod
Director Franziska Buch
script Franziska Buch
production Christoph Holch ,
Uschi Reich ,
Peter Zenk ,
Susanne van Lessen
music Biber Gullatz ,
Eckes Malz
camera Hannes Hubach
cut Patricia Rommel
occupation

Emil and the Detectives is a German feature film by Franziska Buch from 2001 . It is based freely on the novel of the same name by Erich Kästner .

action

Emil lives with his single father in a small town on the Baltic coast with the fictional name Streiglitz . Emil's mother has left the family. Apart from occasional letters from Canada in which his mother sends money, Emil is no longer in contact with her.

Emil's father is unemployed. But he got the chance of a new job when a company from West Germany settled in the small East German town. However, shortly after being hired, he caused an accident and lost his driver's license. Since he needs this as a representative , he is about to lose his job again.

Since the father is in the hospital after the accident, Emil is supposed to go to Berlin to see Pastor Hummel, a sister of his class teacher, during the vacation . Emil found out from a friend that you can get anything in Berlin, including fake driver's licenses. So he secretly decides to get one for his father in Berlin, and in return empties the “future fund” with the money collected from his mother's letters. On the train ride to Berlin he meets Max Grundis. Its special distinguishing marks are blond hair, sharpened canines in the mouth as vampire teeth, black clothing, a red briefcase and red cowboy boots. Grundis sees that Emil has 1,500 DM with him. Using his cell phone, he arranges a meeting with a gang that sells fake IDs and driver's licenses at this price, and notes the meeting point on a slip for Emil. The "successful business" should be toasted. But knockout drops are added to the drink , so that Grundis can steal Emil's money without being violent.

Emil only wakes up at the Berlin Zoo station and just sees Maxgrundis disappearing on the platform. He immediately goes into pursuit. Of course, this proves to be very difficult in a foreign city. Finally, he watches him as he stops to eat at Oberbaum-Eck , from the back yard through a ventilation pipe in the restaurant kitchen. Fortunately, he meets the defensive pony hat here. After briefly explaining what had happened, she immediately agreed to help Emil. Since she is the leader of a really large, flexible gang of children, helpers are rounded up quickly enough to shadow the thief.

Pastor Hummel, a single parent, who is notoriously short of time, arrives with her son Gustav much too late to pick up their guest at the Zoo station. Since they don't meet him, they both decide to go home first, as Emil has the address and is possibly already on his way to see them. Gustav, a gifted and very precocious boy, is not enthusiastic about the upcoming visit. He always sees himself as the victim of his mother's humanitarian activities. Since the two of them have never seen Emil, the gang of children decides that Gypsie from the gang will simply pretend to be Emil. While playing on the PC, Gypsie accidentally deletes the template Gustav wrote for the sermon that the pastor will need the following day. Together, the two cook up a new speech on children's rights . Gypsie has to confess to Gustav that he is not the real Emil and lets him in on the secret search for the stolen money. Gustav helps the gang of children with his technical skills in coordinating the pursuit of the thief.

Emil and the detectives unobtrusively follow Max Grundis first on foot and then with a wild chase in the taxi to the Hotel Adlon , where he takes a room. At the reception, Pony Hütchen uses a lot of finesse to find the second key to his room, which she visits with Emil while Maxgrundis is dining in the restaurant. While Emil searches in vain for his money in the room , Grundis turns out to be a hotel thief who breaks into the rooms of other guests with stolen keys, steals their jewelry and takes it with him in his suitcase. Emil manages to hide in Grundis' room when he suddenly comes back. After Grundis fell asleep, Emil took the suitcase in which he assumed his money was in. Emil loses the note on the place and time of the meeting with the gang of forgers. The next morning, this meeting is at the lockers at the Alexanderplatz underground station . Pony and Emil are there with the suitcase, which does not contain any cash, only jewelry. Therefore, the business with the two forgers fails. However, when Pony offers an earring from the ice loot as a deposit, the two crooks show the contents of the suitcase. The children can only prevent their suitcases from being taken away by fleeing into the subway.

Grundis, who had found Emil's note, also observed the meeting with the gang of forgers from a distance and participates in the pursuit of the children in order to regain his booty. While the two forgers want to catch up with the subway on an elevated section of the line with a wild chase on the road below, Grundis jumps on the departing subway and clings to the next station at the end of the train. When the children realize that they are being followed, they try to shake off their pursuers by changing trains in the Gleisdreieck underground station . In the resulting mess, Emil is able to flee in a subway with the booty suitcase, but sees Grundis pony holding hats on the platform and kidnapping them. He blackmailed his prey in exchange for pony. The exchange takes place as planned the next morning in front of the giraffe enclosure in the zoological garden : Pony Hütchen is released, Grundis gets his suitcase back with the prey. However, Emil and the detectives have organized around 1,800 children who follow Grundis through leaflets that they are distributing throughout the city, so that Grundis finally flees to the church, where Pastor Hummel is giving her sermon written by Gustav and Gypsie. The children tell what happened, whereupon ground ice wants to flee and riots break out. Pastor Hummel has the police called and the bells ring. The police officers who have arrived arrest Grundis.

Emil receives a reward of DM 5,000, which a hotel guest offered for finding the stolen jewelry, and his father gets a job for which he does not need a driver's license. For Emil's next birthday during the autumn break he has his driver's license again and secretly invites the entire Berlin gang to the Baltic Sea to surprise his son and reward him for his heroic deed.

particularities

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In this film, the novel Emil and the Detectives was adapted to the realities of modern times. Topics such as unemployment and broken family relationships are taken up, and there is also a personal computer , as it was only developed after the novel was published.

Opinions on the remake are divided. Some see it as a legitimate revision of the Kästner novel that deals with the needs of today's generation of children. Others see the original idea and intention so hidden by innovations that it is almost completely lost. Many characters would lose their actual character, which in some cases decisively influences and changes the story.

The characters of Pony and "Gustav with the horn" were integrated into completely changed social environments (Pony is no longer Emil's cousin here, but the boss of a gang of children who come from an impoverished host family; Gustav became both his character and his trademark, the horn, taken and he became the highly intelligent son of Pastor Hummel).

Basically, these roles were swapped with one another; in a changed social environment. The fact that a girl is the head of the detectives gives girls a strong identification figure.

Film background

The shooting on the Baltic Sea coast takes place in a nature reserve that has not been allowed to be entered by people without permission for years. It is a dune area like the one at Darßer Ort .

Filming locations in Berlin include the Zoologischer Garten train station , Berlin-Kreuzberg with the exterior view of the Oberbaum-Eck pub , the Great Star on the Victory Column , Strasse des 17. Juni , Pariser Platz and the Hotel Adlon . A focus is on scenes with the yellow carriages of the underground line 1 , especially the above-ground route through Berlin-Kreuzberg, the Oberbaumbrücke and the Schlesisches Tor underground station . The skateboard ride shows, among other things, the Kulturforum , the Museum Island and the Brandenburg Gate . The roof of the technology museum and the elephant gate of the zoological garden also became the location. Last but not least, the street front in front of Wohlthat'schen Buchhandlung in Budapester Strasse can also be seen. The crowd scenes take place in Schöneberger Kiez Rote Insel and at the Königin-Luise-Gedächtniskirche .

Other films

There are a total of eight film adaptations of the book Emil and the Detectives .

  • (Germany, 1931) - Director: Gerhard Lamprecht
  • (UK, 1935) - Director: Milton Rosmer
  • (Argentina, 1950) - Director: Antonio Momplet
  • (Germany, 1954) - Director: Robert Adolf Stemmle
  • (Japan, 1956) - Director: Mitsuo Wakasugi
  • (Brazil, 1958) - Director: Alberto Pieralisi
  • (USA, 1964) - Director: Peter Tewksbury
  • (Germany, 2001) - Director: Franziska Buch

A direct comparison of the three German films gives you some insights into the tastes of the times and the changes in Berlin .

Awards

Web links