Soloalbum (2003) Reviews

• Funny, light comedy that borrows from "High Fidelity"

  Superunknovvn2003-10-25

  I'm not a big fan of German movies at all, so I didn't expect too much from this flick, when my girlfriend talked me into renting it. However, "Soloalbum" turned out to be an entertaining little comedy/romance with a well chosen cast and witty dialogue. One couldn't overlook that the model for this movie was another, much better movie/book named "High Fidelity". Ben, the main character, has two friends, just like Rob in Hornby's book, his flat bares some similarities to John Cusack's in "Hi-Fi" and like Rob Ben thinks about calling five of his ex-girlfriends at some point of the story. One dialogue was almost a complete rip-off of the scene in "High Fidelity", where John Cusack asks Jack Black, what he would say, if he told him, he hadn't seen "Evil Dead 2", "yet". Another thing that I didn't like about the movie was the lack of good songs. A story about a music journalist with love troubles should have a good soundtrack. Apart from Elvis Costello's "Almost Blue" the movie only contained throw-away pop songs, which is a shame. Thankfully, "Soloalbum" is still charming enough to make for a pleasant viewing. "High Fidelity" is still king, though.

• Bad Acting and Theft

  DanTheMan19822011-03-20

  After reading the decent book I decided to watch the movie and lived to rue it. The acting is as bad as in most German movies, only Schweighoefer does a half-decent job. About the plot: A young bon vivant treats his girlfriend like crap, she breaks up with him (and is using the phrase "the killer in me is the killer in you" from the song "Disarm" by The Smashing Pumpkins, which makes absolutely no sense and was probably used just to make the movie look cool), he is devastated and tries to get her back. That's it. There are so many things that were stolen from "High Fidelity", which is why the voting is so bad. Just making a copy of High Fidelity isn't going to do the trick, and since High Fidelity is way better, Soloalbum is not worth the watch.

• nice and easy

  y3llow2003-05-18

  this is not one of the big ones. but, in fact, it is one of the funniest german movies of the last years. nothing´s really breath-taking, but what we got here is a young and refreshing camerawork and the unconventional intention just to do entertainment. the story itself ("how to get back the ex in 10 steps?")is known, but the young director´s enthusiasm is visible in every scene; and this feeling you get by watching it is what fills some holes considering plot, actors and not-THAT-funny jokes. a try to transfer the specific pop - literature style into the movies. nice one.

• Why say "little", it's nothing

  loohzee2004-08-01

  No, i would not want to see this film again. The leading character is flat, you don't want to join his life, not even in the "sx"-episodes. You don't believe, what is happening to him, why she, Katharina, the only amiable character, comes back to him (is she this dull?), the plot is thinner than silk. The Californian studios would have made a acceptable main-streamer nothing out of it, but don't waste our (german) tax for "Filmfoerderung". And erase this little boy named Ben, who has lived through such many years of wisdom. Don't compare this to High Fidelity! Have You seen any DVD-Xtra-features: There are none visible...

• Typical german kind of "comedy"

  werrybold2003-11-01

  To make it short...it´s boring. If you have seen german romantic comedy tales before, you already know that one. The characters are stereotype and the story trivial. Granted, the film has two or three funny moments, but they can´t compensate for the weakness of this movie. 2 of 10 Points (and thats generous of me, because I like Nora Tschirner)