Horst in Translation ([email protected])
"Das Millionenspiel" or "The Millions Game" is a West German television movie from 1970, so this one had its 45th anniversary last year already. It is based on Robert Sheckley's novel and for script writer Wolfgang Menge and director Tom Roelle, it is among their most known works from their career. The film runs for 95 minutes and looks to the untrained eye like an episode of a rather bizarre game show. Some people probably believed this was real. Fake documentaries on aliens or exotic diseases were not too unusual in the last decades, but a fake game-show is pretty unique. The concept here is as simple as it gets. A man has to live long enough and reach a certain destination to receive lots of money, while 3 followers want the money as well and they keep chasing him. If they kill him, they get the money.This film can be appreciated from several perspectives. The first would be as a genuine thriller drama and tricking yourself into actually thinking everything you see is real. The second would be as a piece of dystopian fiction that has become real on some occasions, frighteningly real, in the last almost five decades. But no matter which take you choose, you will be very well entertained. The cast here includes some famous names too. While lead actor, the late Jörg Pleva, is not anymore today, you will see very early screen appearances from Didi Hallervorden (as far away from his usual genre comedy as it gets) and Dieter Thomas Heck as the show master here. And while Heck is basically just exactly the same like in all the shows he actually hosted, I am still tempted to say he was the MVP here. A brilliant portrayal how he turns all this absurdity about justified murder (with no punishment, but a gigantic reward) into something that has just become normal. I would not want to live in this time and age. And with Hallervorden, he was so good that I wondered why he has not played villains more often in his career, but rather likable slobs. Admittedly, he did that very well too. I really liked the interview because it shows that he and his two colleagues were just doing their job and the really bad guys are the interviewers, hosts and producers of this program. He would not want to be one of them, no matter how much money he got paid. He'd rather be the one running for his life. Or the one taking this life.It's not a perfect film by any means and here and there, there is a scene or moment that felt a bit weak. but that was just because everything else feels so great. I also liked the way they made it look like a television show from start to finish with how they included these commercials, one right before the great final showdown. A perfect depiction of the greed for better ratings and more money because the only winner, in the end, are the people who made this show. Or I am also referring to the strange performance numbers that were shown when nothing too interesting happened in the chase for life and death although it was interesting and breathtaking every single second because he could have died all the time. I also liked the film's ending. The makers don't need tragedy or cheap thrills to make this as memorable and edge-of-seat as you could imagines. One of the best films from 1970. I highly recommend the watch.
