“With imprisonment not under a year, it is punished for those who carry out sexual acts on one person under the age of fourteen (child) or have it carried out by the child.” Few people probably know where exactly they would have to look up in the Criminal Code in order to find this paragraph. The twelve -year -old title character from Christina Tournatzés' “Karla“However, it not only looked up, but literally internalized it. It is paragraph 176.
Tournatzés looks behind the paragraphs in her feature film debut and is devoted to the true case of Karla Ebel (Elise Krieps), which was abused by her foster father Karl Ebel (Torben Liebecht). In 1962 she sued her rapist on her own. Elise Krieps, the daughter of actress Vicky Krieps and actor Jonas Laux, celebrated her acting debut in the role of the young protagonist. At the Munich Film Festival, “Karla” won – completely right! – Two funding prices of the series New German cinema: for Christina Tournatzés sensitive direction and for the script by Yvonne Görlach, which consistently breaks with common patterns.
Such attitudes make it clear how much courage Karla must have applied to oppose not only to her foster father, but also to the judicial apparatus.
Karla speaks her first words in the film in the police station: “I am Karla Ebel. I am twelve years old and I would like to file a complaint.” Against Karl Ebel. She demands a judge to speak and quotes paragraph 176. You can feel that this girl has prepared. While Karla and the judge Lamy (Rainer Bock) negotiate the case in numerous conversations, she friends in the girls' dormitory with her residential generation Ada (Carlotta von Falkenhayn). When the friends experience a carefree moment there, a nun warns immediately, how inappropriate it is in their situation.
The film changes between the perspectives of Karla and Lemy. The judge insists on facts, while Karla stays strong and persistently is silent for the judiciary. The girl does not reveal all the details of rape to keep her dignity. She even refuses to investigate the gynecologist. But in order for an accused to be punished, the crime and the crime must be documented and described precisely – and so the two have to find a middle ground in their communication in order to really meet each other.
How to translate speechlessness into cinema images
Christina Tournatzés finds a strong picture for Karla's self -determined silence: Whenever Karla does not want to speak, she falls silent in the middle of the description of a preliminary in the facts, strikes a tuning fork and continues elsewhere. This fragmentary narrative also runs through the choice of pictures. The rape is never explicitly shown, instead Tournatzés uses blurred film recordings as scraps of memory. You can hear the hum of a meat fly that you have heard before. Shortly afterwards Karla ran away from something.
Like the judge, the audience only learns to interpret Klara's hints over time. But one also understands that Karla has difficulty capturing her terrible memories. She compares her world with the world of children from the fantasy novel “The Chronicles of Narnia”: “You go to another world. That's how I feel when that happens.” She strikes the tuning fork again. “I disappear, somehow. To a different place where everything is different. And the girl who has happened I am not me.”
Elise Krieps delivers an impressive acting debut in “Karla”.
So that Elise Krieps could experience the process directly, Tournatzés did not simply present the script for the young actress, but instead spoke to her about the case. In addition, Tournatzés shot chronologically with her. Only on a daily Krieps experienced the entire extent of the legal. Only late she got to read the whole book at her own request. Krieps finds a good tone between speechlessness and controlled speech, takes back in the game, speaks quietly but definitely.
You can feel the courage to raise the girl to oppose the judge, who almost wanted to refuse the case hopelessly for him for reasons of image. With the words of Mascha Kaléko, his secretary (inogenic cog) persuades him, who works for the girl right from the start: “It only takes one island in the wide sea. It only takes one person, but it takes a lot.” Lamy will also learn a lot about humanity from Karla.
Conclusion: “Karla” is much more than a court drama. It is a plea for humanity and the right to silence.
We saw “Karla” at the Munich Film Festival in 2025, where he celebrated his world premiere.