Content/criticism
Actually, Dirk Reimann (Michael Wachter) should appear as a speaker at an event on the topic of start-ups. Instead, he was brutally killed by a blow to the back of the head, and his body is found at Munich’s Eisbach. Luke Laim (Max Simonischek) and Anton Simhandl (Gerhard Wittmann) then take over the case. A trail leads them to Anno Waldeck (Christoph Schechinger) and Lin Yu Choi (Kotti Yun) with whom the dead man had worked until they forced him out of the company. But also Cecily Filander (Adina Vetter), which looks after the homeless, is part of the investigation. This isn’t easy for Laim, as he knows her from his childhood…
Sixth part of the crime series
Max Simonischek has been investigating as chief inspector since 2012 Laim. At first it didn’t look like it was going to be a particularly productive series. It took five years for a second part, and the third took another three years to arrive. In the television crime segment, where it is usual to produce several films a year, that is very little. That has now changed. Although the number of viewers is not as large as that of other colleagues, Laim and the rabbit heart even failed to reach the 5 million mark last year. But the stories about the aloof, tall police officer are at least sufficiently popular to warrant a new installment every year. And so the series goes along Laim and the sleeping dogs into the sixth round.
The film poses puzzles in several ways. Of course, this is partly intentional. If a body is found at the beginning and then several suspects are investigated, then it’s a classic whodunnit. The audience should speculate a lot at home and put forward hypotheses about who could be behind the murder – and for what reasons. There are various tracks for this purpose. The most obvious one is in Laim and the sleeping dogs First of all, of course, that it somehow has to do with the start-ups that everything revolves around. It’s just not entirely clear why the person who was booted out should be a murder victim. Usually you expect it to be the other way around. If Reimann had taken revenge, it would have been obvious. But that doesn’t make any sense at first.
Promoters and losers
However, things get really confusing when the police find out that the dead man was a homeless person. It may be obvious that Reimann is relegated after his professional failure, especially since it is said that he generally didn’t get much done. But why is someone whose start-up failed and who no longer has a home invited to speak at this event? This makes no sense either in terms of organization or content. Actually, stories like this only feature people who have achieved something and want to take others with them. Overall is Laim and the sleeping dogs a pretty contrived case. On the one hand, it is certainly attractive when the start-up scene, which throws around buzzwords, is contrasted with the losers in society. You just shouldn’t expect the result to be meaningful or even realistic. It’s all very constructed.
The atmosphere looks better there. The staging of the aloof and ice-cold founding elite, which mercilessly plunders others, is particularly successful. You freeze here just looking at it. Simois check (The neighbors from above) has made himself so comfortable in his role as a lone wolf that everything runs itself. The character isn’t really original; you can find lots of crime dramas with people like that on public television. At least Laim isn’t being so strenuously stubborn as he was recently Stralsund: The long shadow has demonstrated. There are also some really nice scenes with him and the runaway Karl (Sarah Mahita). This helps you feel Laim and the sleeping dogs can already look at. A more realistic, less exaggerated approach to the subject would have been more interesting, which is why the film is weaker than its direct predecessors.
Credits
OT: “Laim and the Sleeping Dogs”
Land: USA, France
Year: 2023
Director: Michael Schneider
Script: Birgit Maiwald
Music: Dirk Leupolz
Camera: Andreas Zickgraf
Occupation: Max Simonischek, Gerhard Wittmann, Sarah Mahita, Adina Vetter, Thomas Niehaus, Heinz-Josef Braun, Christoph Schechinger, Kotti Yun
2023-09-18 18:42:37
#Laim #sleeping #dogs #Filmreviews.de
