Goldene Zeiten

Peter did with BANG BOOM BANG a very good and very funny movie - maybe the best German comedy in a new-style ever. But in his second movie you can see, that there is no substance in his art and talent. Maybe it is the same problem of Thomas Jahn, the director of Knocking On Heavens Door - no ideas and no talent for really good scripts. The look and the coolness of the business is more interesting then a good script and really good ideas.

And there is also for Peter as for Thomas nothing more as a filmmaker then their very funny first movies.

It is a typical situation for the German movies. One or two movies are really good, the rest is nothing but nonsenses and overacting as a movie-maker. Peter seems to be a wanna-be (and who watched his audio-commentary to Bang Boom Bang knows the he is a notorious wanna-be). The typical amateur-movie-setting (the all-time-local-hero feeling in his movies) makes him a good director for his town and friends. But for a good movie it needs more the then privacy of a local-hero.

So it is a professional amateur-movie.

I was at the premiere of "Goldene Zeiten" in Unna/Germany today. The director Peter Thorwarth has some kind of fan base in this city, because some movies (at least "Bang, Boom, Bang" and "Was nicht passt wird passend gemacht") of him play in Unna. "Goldene Zeiten" also plays in Unna.

Nevertheless the audience of this comedy was very quiet. There were only a few good laughs. A lot of scenes that were presumably meant to be funny didn't really work even for this propitious audience.

The characters of this movie were all pictured rather one-dimensional and I didn't really feel for any of them. With 130 minutes runtime this movie was at least 30 minutes too long and I was kind of bored at the end.

The two previous efforts of Peter Thorwarth ("Bang, Boom, Bang" and "Was nicht passt wird passend gemacht") were much more enjoyable for me. So I recommend to rather watch these and to skip "Goldene Zeiten".

This movie is not as funny as Thorwarths first two movies, namely "Bang Boom Bang" and "Was nicht passt wird passend gemacht".

And that was not the intention at all. I cannot conclude with other comments describing the depicted characters as being one-dimensional. As usual, Ralf Richter kind of plays himself, and is good at impersonating the low life small criminal.

And Dirk Benedicts performance is absolutely believable. He plays an average guy who suddenly gets the chance to enter the stand in the spotlight of show-business, and who starts to really like it. His lines are funny ("I did not want to play John Stryker anymore, all those Bang Boom Bang, that shooting in afternoon series like 'A-Team', that really pi**ed me off"), and he really delivers the tragic aspects of his character.

Thorvarths movies are always over the top in regards of how the action and the stories culminate, but this kind of exaggeration is often funny in itself.

I like this kind of mixture between comic and tragedy, in that case I would compare it to "Boogie Nights", which tone reminds me of "Goldene Zeiten".

I really enjoyed watching "Bang Boom Bang" and "Was nicht passt wird passend gemacht". I watched those movies several times and never got bored. Unfortunately "Goldene Zeiten" is not that good. Maybe it is the lack of interesting characters or the fact that everything just centers around the Dirk Benedict plot which isn't funny enough to cover for two hours. To sum it up: Yes, it is kind of boring sometimes. The characters are very weak (which is totally different in Thorwarth's other movies) and the story has nothing to offer but a simple plot which suffers from the lack of good ideas hidden behind some violence. I think it would be a good TV movie but it's not enough for the big screen. For fans it is still enjoyable and I liked Ludger Pistor's acting/character so it gets 6 of 10 from me. Sad that this movie might not win a lot of new fans.

When it came out, it completely went by me and I just got a hold of it a couple of years later. Even after re-watching it recently, I felt it was a nice little movie. Wotan who's in the lead role (and he isn't often enough considering he's much better at it than some other A-Listers in Germany), has the charisma to lead the movie. Even Dirk Benedict who has a very extended cameo playing himself, but as someone else, is really funny.

Many say this isn't the funniest movie the director made and this may be true (there is a lot of dark moments in there too that might take away some of the fun for some people), but I like the way he mixed it up. You can never be too sure about the outcome, when there are variables that you can not connect. Some characters might act strange, but that always happens. One of the better comedies to come out of Germany in the last 10 years.