Sabine Bohlmann is not only the German voice of Lisa Simpson, but also from 13-year-old Tiny Tina, a mentally unstable explosive expert who prefers her enemies in the USK-18 video games of the “Borderlands” series with Dynamite in the air . But where the voice speaker, which has been much employed since 1984, also likes to travel a corner of subversive in a vocal manner, her educational guides and children's stories about “Ms. Honey” or the “Little Sailor” are always “pedagogically valuable”. Her “Willow” books are also particularly successful in a circle of nature-loving young witches, of which five volumes have already appeared between 2020 and 2024.
Even who has not yet known the stories of the red -haired girl with the hidden witch powers, but a lot is now likely to be known. Finally, “Willow” is one of the countless Young-Adult Fantasy fabrics that have long since taken over the supremacy on the bookshop shelves after the success of “Harry Potter” & Co. . And because there are so many successful books in this genre, more and more of it make it to the cinema. Nevertheless, “A girl named Willow“From” The Chaos Sisters “director Mike Marzuk from the crowd-not because of his history, but because of the loving implementation.
Willow (Ava Petsch) still has to find her three co-jung witches in order to develop their full magic potential.
Willow (really good: Ava Petsch) and her single father Adam (Golo Euler) inherited. Great Aunt Alwina (Sibylle Canonica) left the house to the two, in which Willow grew up until her mother died, even if she can hardly remember that time. In addition, Willow has received her own forest – including Windschiefer Hütte. At first the eleven-year-old can do little with the trees and mosses, but soon she knows every animal and every shrub like her western pocket-and then she comes across Grimmoor (Max Giermann), a lively witchbook with “Double M and Double-O” .
Grimmoor explains Willow that witch powers are slumbering – and a first test shows that it seems to have a special relationship with fire. But in order to be able to exploit their full potential, it must first complete the circle – and find three other young witches that specialize in the missing elements of air, earth and water. And the time is urgent: Because the tax office suddenly demands inheritance taxes, Willows is to be sold-to the speculator couple Geier & Geier (Melika Foroutan, Michael Ostrowski), who want to build a shopping center in the middle of nature …
Handmade instead of pixel art
There is a magical pasture in “A girl named Willow”, a tree full of keys and a plant -scoured piano that simply continues on its own after a few keyboard attacks. But the eye-catcher par excellence still remains “LOL” duration guest Max Giermann as a grimmoor: hair, eyebrows, beard, skin and clothing all look as if they actually consist of ancient hand-described pages (which is why the lively witchbook also prefers to drink bookbinder glue). Of course you would have been able to get such an effect on the computer, but instead you can only guess how long the arm had to sit in the mask every morning before the start of the shoot. But no matter how long it was, the “suffering” was definitely worth it.
There are also CGI effects, for example when the four young witches combine their magic powers for the first time and illuminate the night sky for the first time. But because they are used sparingly, they have a stronger effect than if you were flooded with effects-and you simply feel that the makers preferred to take one step instead of simply on the simple out-computer To resort to the solution. Otherwise, that would certainly have been detrimental to the whole back-to-the-element-strength of the-nature theme.
The visual highlight of the film: At Grimmoor (Max Giermann), the costume managers really have no compromises.
Apparently it was also similar in the casting: with AVa Petsch As Willow (fire), Cora Traube as Valentina (air), Anna von Seld as Gretchen (water) and Mary Tölle as Lotti (earth) found the responsible people four real types for their witch circles. The only drop of bitterness: Because it takes half the film until Willow has identified its fellow campaigners at all and then the forest must be saved immediately, there are only a few scenes so far that focus on the connection of the girls. This is literally elementary for a witch circling. Here in particular, there would definitely be room for improvement in possible sequels.
And for the adult accompaniment, the occupation list also has a delicacy: After seven -year -old canvas, Diana Amft shines (since “the boy has to be in the fresh air”) as slightly compressed but super charming neighbor – and conjures up all “girl, girl!” – and/or “Doctor's Diary” fans among us a smile in the face.
Conclusion: Young adult stories with magical fantasy elements are now available like sand by the sea. As loving films as “a girl named Willow” are much less common.