Das Privileg

I'm so sorry but this left me so confused and disappointed. The plot was bad and the execution worse, clearly suffering from bad writing. I shouldn't have wasted my time on this.

The film starts promisingly. It stars some interesting newcomers who are already known from the successful German series Dark. The look of individual scenes is also good and reminds me of a mixture of Stranger things and dark.

However, the story starts to lose its thread after a few minutes. Thus, the story loses itself in a crude mixture of horror, black magic and some splatter. But nothing of it really seriously works. As a viewer, I did not experience any creepy feelings or scared at any point.

For my taste, there were clearly too many logic errors and implausible decisions by the characters. One happy coincidence follows the next.

Overall, the series seems conceptless and lovelessly designed. The best thing is the cast, even if all actors remain below their potential.

The Privilege wastes no time as within 10 minutes, there's blood, some violence, an evil creature and a death. The bold and horrifying opening is enough to capture your attention and build your curiosity to know more.

Overall, Netflix's latest German supernatural film doesn't pack any scares or screams due to a rushed plot and weak execution. It has enough bloodshed, gore, black magic and bad guys. But none of them is used in full potential to appreciate the interesting premise.

They tried to go somewhere here. There was an attempt to create some sort of story, some sort of intensity...there were even rumors of a plot dare I say? But alas, it was all an illusion. Not sure what exactly the director was going for here but if it was a hot mess then - nailed it! Look, a film of this genre (well really one of any genre) can have all the promise in the world, but if it's thrown onto the screen haphazardly audiences are gonna eventually see it for the muddle that it is. In all fairness, if this was spun a different way, and in not such a dysfunctional fashion - maybe it would have succeeded better... Naja.

So many things happening in quick successions and I checked it's only 30 minutes in. The first 2/3 of the movie has a rapid pace like Geminis flipping through the channels (no offence to Geminis everywhere). Kinda like The Crimes of Grindelwald but even quicker.

It's a blend of everything from Resident Evil, Conjuring/Insidious, Us and the usual teenage drama stuff. However with everything happening this needs to double its runtime or a 4-6 episode miniseries. 100 minutes duration is just too rushed.

Production is exquisite, the locations and atmosphere feels authentic. Acting is good.

I'd recommend this if you want to take a break from glacially-paced shows and it should be a much better experience with a few glasses of Sancerre.