Maria Furtwängler has been investigating Lower Saxony for 20 years. To celebrate the day, viewers can learn a new word: “refugee folklore.” Unfortunately, there is not much more to get out of the anniversary episode.
In ARD jargon, themed “crime scenes” are the crime stories that are supposed to be about more than the banal answer to the question of who the murderer is. If you’re already getting a queasy feeling in your stomach, you’re right: As is so often the case, the latest case from Göttingen is a prime example of how a socio-politically relevant topic does not guarantee a good film.
“Revenge on the World” is not only Maria Furtwängler’s 20th birthday as “Tatort” inspector Charlotte Lindholm, it should also be a lesson on the fine line between prejudice and reasonable suspicion. The film wants to show the excesses of negative and positive racism in equal measure and how quickly one slips into the latter. Screenwriter Daniel Nocke and director Stefan Krohmer explain this by asking how sensitive the police have to be when dealing with refugees in a murder investigation – or not.
Specifically, it’s about the murder of a young refugee helper: the main suspects are first a very German serial sex offender and later a Syrian refugee, more on that in our quick check. In the end, neither of them is responsible for the murder, but that’s pretty much the only surprise in this “crime scene”.
“The revenge on the world” wants to pack an incredible amount of material into 90 minutes of broadcasting time and fails miserably. Almost every scene degenerates into a cliché: sometimes the prototype of an everyday racist provides the description of the perpetrator, then again a group of black footballers dances between clotheslines in front of their tents set up on the sidelines during a break in play. If then the completely overexcited Lindholm a pack of footballers dripping with testosterone “Women can even lock you up here!” yells at you, even the last bit of relevance is sent.
The film wants to play with the expectations of the viewers and the investigators alike, who are repeatedly thrown back on their prejudices and consequently have to question them again and again. At least that’s the plan, but it doesn’t work out in any way: the characters are too simplistic, the dialogues too high-school.
After all, the Syrian main suspect, who is one of the few characters not portrayed in a completely stereotypical way, at some point throws the term “refugee folklore” into the room. He’s referring to the program he’s running for his helpers: They expect spicy Syrian food and horror stories from the torture chamber to justify their efforts. A fitting word for an interesting spin that deserves even more attention. But as it is, “The revenge on the world” remains an involuntarily shallow birthday present for Lindholm’s 20th anniversary.
(This article was first published on Sunday, October 09, 2022.)
