A birthday wish goes very wrong in this German forest fairy tale with teeth.
Mia, 12, is spending her vacation at a lake in the Black Forest with her parents, who have been separated for years, and their new partners. While the adults try to keep things light, Mia escapes more and more often into the forest, where she meets a mysterious boy. On the morning of her birthday, Mia disappears. The fragile family structure is turned upside down and Mia's new freedom becomes increasingly dangerous.
Cinematography
Black Forest shots that make dread look gorgeous.
Acting
Lennox Halm's mysterious boy — unsettling without explaining.
Director
Michael Baumann
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
Baumann filmed in the actual Black Forest using natural light only, creating that specific gloom that no artificial setup replicates.
The film deliberately echoes German Romanticism's 'Waldeinsamkeit' — forest solitude as spiritual experience — then twists it into something claustrophobic.
DE
