An infant is the focus of a small culture war. The film “Family is a celebration – baptism alarm” lives from the good-humored actors.
Berlin – What name a newborn baby gets is often a tricky question. Also for Viola (Amelie Kiefer): She is still carried away by the exhausting birth of her son. Your wish is the name Linus.
The Persian father Faraz (Reza Brojerdi) and grandma Anoushe (Sima Seyed) would prefer the first name of Faraz’s Muslim grandfather Masud (Ramin Yazdani) – if only because of tradition. That would be enough fuel for the ARD comedy “Familie ist ein Fest – Taufalarm” on Friday at 8:15 pm in the first.
But that’s not the only point of contention: Viola’s Catholic parents – Beatrice (Victoria Trauttmansdorff) and Holger (Dominic Raacke) – really want to see their grandson baptized, but the Muslim grandparents definitely want a ritual circumcision of their first grandson, if necessary secretly .
Religion is actually not that important to the previously unmarried, freshly baked parents. But that is exactly why they suddenly slip from one dilemma to another and soon have to wonder whether they are again being put under by their surprisingly stubborn parents. Completely unexpectedly, they can also grapple with their own identities and decide among themselves what they really want. The search for a compromise that as many family members as possible can agree to puts their relationship to an unexpected and painful test.
Director Sebastian Hilger (37, “Love does not expire”) has staged his comedy, which is unfortunately partly woodcut-like, a bit lengthy, which could also be due to the lack of bite and the quickly exhausted question about baptism.
The subject of the film knows how to convince: What is more important – traditional or modern? Patriarchy or Free Spirit? Will the dominant grandparents prevail in the end? But before that happens, Faraz flies to his family in Iran to clarify the basics – while the wealthy Holger is giving his daughter a spacious apartment.
The film is carried by the well-humored actors who, in their roles, allude to one or the other cliché according to the motto: What is right – or wrong? Does that even exist? In addition, completely bourgeois scenes at family celebrations at home or in the allotment garden, which are considered normal, can be seen, the dialogues are fairly clear and mostly sensitive.
Conclusion: Family can be exhausting because everyone has to decide for themselves how important belief, religion and origin are to them. The strangely indecisive ending of this film doesn’t provide an answer to any of this – but it probably doesn’t even exist. dpa
