System Crasher

Nine-year-old Benni is a tornado in a pink bubble jacket, and already a veteran of the social services systems. Every time there appears to be some hope that Benni could move back home with her disillusioned mother, it erupts into violent rages, tears, and medication. She is a system crasher, someone who can’t quite adapt to the status quo. Someone there is no real place for.

Actress Helena Zengel (born 2008) portrays Benni with such nerve and presence that it reminds us of such iconic turns as Jean-Pierre Leáud in The 400 Blows (1959), and newer classics like the leading actor in Xavier Dolan’s Mommy (2014).

Zengel herself steals the show, but the film is also characterised throughout by very strong performances: Especially noteworthy is Albrecht Shuch (who is also starring in Alfred Döblin’s remake of Alexanderplatz) and Gabriela Schmeide (known from Haneke’s The White Ribbon), as the two social workers who go above and beyond in their attempts to salvage any semblance of a normal life for Benni.