Joey (film)

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Movie
German title Joey
Original title Joey
Country of production Germany , USA
original language English
Publishing year 1985
length 98 minutes
Age rating FSK 12
Rod
Director Roland Emmerich
script Roland Emmerich,
Hans J. Haller
production Willi Segler
music Hubert Bartholomae
camera Egon Werdin
cut Carl Colpaert ,
Alan Toomayan ,
Tomy Wigand
occupation

Joey is the second full-length feature film by director Roland Emmerich . It was released in German cinemas on November 21, 1985.

action

Nine year old Joey lost his father. He mourns a lot and is also macabre mocked by his classmates. Only the girl Sally stands by him. When Joey is alone in his room, his toy phone rings. At first he shrinks back, but in the following period he regularly telephones with the voice on the other side, which he and the viewer take to be his father. Toys also move around space through telekinetic abilities. Even Joey himself can soon use telekinetic powers and does so in front of his mother. Sally also finds out about it and shows no fear. After Joey found a ventriloquist doll in a neighboring abandoned house , it soon turns out that the doll is ruled by an evil force. This is apparently also in connection with the death of the former owner of the doll, the variety artist Fletcher. The doll tries to stop Joey from contacting his father. Apparently, it is also the doll that makes a failed knife attack on Joey's mother. The mother later discovers the knife in the wall and from then on distrusts her son's supernatural powers even more. A group of parapsychologists with extensive technical equipment comes into the house and begins to examine Joey. Joey flees to the basement of the house where he found the ventriloquist dummy. With him is Sally, and a group of boys who have made it a habit to pester Joey also follow them. Under the influence of supernatural forces, the environment in the basement is transformed, children's fears take shape. Joey eventually ends up alone in an area where he faces the doll's evil spirit. There is also a door that the doll tries to keep him from going through, but Joey opens it. It seems like there's a place beyond that for Joey to be with his beloved father. The other children have already left the house when the doll is destroyed by Joey's decision and the house collapses. The scientists recover Joey's lifeless body, but their attempts at resuscitation fail. Mother, scientists and children say goodbye to Joey in tears. The children are just leaving Joey's room, where he is lying, when his toys, which have been flying around the house and the surrounding area, return to the room. The children attribute the event to Joey, and Sally goes back to his room. However, the film ends without making a statement about a possible return of the boy from death.

It should be noted that the plot of the American version differs significantly from the plot of the German version summarized above. Both versions are included on the purchase DVD. See also the comparison of the cut versions linked below.

criticism

“What at Spielberg, in spite of all the tendency towards spectacle, always has to do with enchantment, naive amazement, sympathy and emotion, that is, with the characteristics of good entertainment cinema, has become a soulless imitation of bombastically inflated success patterns at Emmerich; what he saw in ET , Poltergeist, and the Star Wars films were just the tricks, not the stories they were embedded in. The 'sorcerer's apprentice' Emmerich copies these tricks in the style of an uninterrupted ghost train ride without having measure, rhythm or feeling for the human dimensions. The plot is irrelevant, rough and psychologically completely inconsistent "

- Horst Peter Koll : film service

“ Joey shows a lot and explains little. That's not bad for an effect film. But when he explains, he explains everything completely wrong. That is fatal. "

- Norbert Stresau : RETRO

The German Film and Media Evaluation FBW in Wiesbaden awarded the film the title valuable.

literature

Martin Eisele : Joey - We'll all meet again , Bastei Lübbe 1985, ISBN 3-404-13013-8 (book about the film)

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Release certificate for Joey . Voluntary self-regulation of the film industry , June 2013 (PDF; test number: 56 015-a V).