Stuck in the middle of the woods, the place attracts all kinds of low-life drifters: Former East German pop music star Michi Fanselow; an irksome bank clerk Claus who, after robbing his bank division, gets on the nerves of his former supervisor nerves and his disillusioned wife Natasha; a band of bohemian musicians, and Ralf, the owner of the place himself, a pigheaded stingy former NATO employee who still feeds his customers with vacuum-packed cookies from his old NATO days.
Director Sören Voigt, in his first feature film, uses the camp site to examine a particular milieu of society in which the mental split between the Westernized FGR and the former GDR is always on the verge of clashing and firing up. Boredom and despair gradually worsen during the film until reaching their wacky, over-the-top apocalyptic finale.
With raffish humor and a rough but candid touch that somewhat resembles the work of great British director Mike Leigh, Voigt allows his characters to throw out their unkempt, sweaty lives on you. By film's end, you find yourself sincerely engaged with their tribulations, and, if fatigued, you've cared for them.
