Greece and Spain were the fastest. But even Germany is still in the top half at 10th place. Since its release in 2016, the Italian comedy “Perfetti Sconosciuti – How many secrets can a friendship tolerate?” remade in 25 other languages - and even holds the world record for the most remakes ever! Many of the new editions were also very successful, including “The Perfect Secret” by “Fack Ju Göhte” director Bora Dagtekin, which made it to number 3 in the German annual charts in 2019 with more than 5.3 million cinemagoers. Despite the strong results, so far there has only been a sequel set on New Year’s Eve in Russia. The concept of a party game in which everyone puts their cell phone open on the table and reads out loud all the incoming messages, revealing more and more secrets over the course of the evening, is not so easy to repeat.
But fortunately, that’s exactly what “Turkish for Beginners” mastermind Bora Dagtekin doesn’t have in mind. Instead, he and his producer Oliver Berben followed the Italian rights holders all the way to the Venice film festival in order to convince them of his very own sequel idea with a spontaneous presentation: No more chamber drama, now it’s off to the sun! The ensemble comedy “The Perfect Vacation” brings together the (some of them no longer best) friends of its predecessor on the Germans’ favorite holiday island – and, in addition to fighting for the best loungers at the pool, lets them nibble on all sorts of old and new secrets. It’s pleasantly lively for a long time – and sometimes really nasty! Only the desire to conclude everything as harmoniously as possible this time noticeably slows down the film – and also unnecessarily stretches it to a running time close to the two-hour mark.
After the spectacular finca explosion, the perfect vacationers have to move unplanned to the all-inclusive club hotel.
The teenage daughter Sophie (Emily Kusche), who is dragged along, sums up the difference from the predecessor perfectly: “No game this time, just toxic!” Rocco (Wotan Wilke Möhring) and Simon (Frederick Lau) secretly flew to Mallorca to use a DNA test to find out whether Rocco might have become a father for the second time 17 years ago. Leo (Elyas M’Barek) also hasn’t revealed to his family that he wants to celebrate the still freshly outed Pepe’s (Florian David Fitz) birthday on the Beer King Island – ideally with a suitable Grindr date. And then there is Carlotta (Karoline Herfurth), who just wants to spend a relaxing girls’ weekend on the island – instead of in the mountains as officially announced – with her childhood friend Maus (Diana Amft) and Rocco’s wife Eva (Jessica Schwarz).
As luck would have it, all three groups end up in the same finca – which, in addition to the old lies, also causes the paranoid, but rarely unfounded, mistrust to flare up again. But there are still three days left to really express yourself in the paradisiacal holiday home – or not, because Simon is fiddling with the gas cartridges with, of all things, a glowing butt in the corner of his mouth. So, for better or worse, the entire group ends up in the two-star club hotel Playa Romantica. Instead of upscale individual tourism, from now on it means Ballermann hits, karaoke evenings and – at least for everyone with an all-inclusive plastic wristband – endless supplies of white wine in proper style from the unrefrigerated Tetra Pak…
Real sausage and dry punchlines
“The Perfect Secret” famously ended very differently than the Italian original. But even if there is a lot to criticize about the feel-good happy ending that was specially designed for the German audience, it at least allows the entire star cast to soak up the Spanish sun together. “The Perfect Vacation” begins with fantastic images of Mallorca – only to then pan directly to full garbage cans and a pressurized tourist shortly before the heron leaves. Bora Dagtekin does not deliver any proletarian profanity overkill like Tom Gerhardt did in “Ballermann 6”. But he once again has the wonderfully dry and at the same time loving way – already tried out in his cult series “Doctor’s Diary” and “Turkish for Beginners” – with which he this time takes on the absurd excesses of modern mass tourism. This can be seen in the club songs composed for the film, which with lines like “the sausage is made from real meat” probably actually have what it takes to be a Schinkenstraße hit…
… and the cameo appearance of the No Angels with their specially produced single “Perfect Kind Of Us” also shows that Dagtekin is not just making fun of the omnipresent all-inclusive abysses, but at the same time also has a certain heart for the bizarre sides of this save-and-drink party culture. So it’s no wonder that in the sequel, of all people, the newly added cast members Diana Amft (“A Girl Called Willow”) and Jan van Weyde are allowed to shine the most as the fearless Swiss-army-knife universal entertainer – after all, they get by without the lying-and-cheating story ballast of the predecessor and can therefore throw themselves into the 25+ degree holiday chaos without reserve (including one Birthday serenade stripper, who here hops out of a sangria packet rather than out of a cake.
After behaving like homophobic assholes in the previous film, Rocco (Wotan Wilke Möhring), Simon (Frederick Lau) and Leo (Elyas M’Barek) now become queer allies for their friend Pepe (Florian David Fitz).
The old and new relationship distortions – from the paternity test to cheating flirt chats to Pepe’s self-discovery as a gay man – remain primarily a means to an end in order to somehow keep the constant chaos of keeping secrets going. For example, Mouse and Pepe have to pretend to be a married couple with a daughter in order to get to the video recorder with the recordings of Simon’s coke consumption – just one of many confusion comedy contortions. That’s all okay in itself, but it always slows the stars down due to the sheer volume of strands – Karoline Herfurth (“Wonderful”), who is in a fantastic mood, seems to be just waiting this time to be finally let off the leash. Likewise, with Jessica Schwarz (“The Canoe of Manitu”), in addition to the whole psychoanalysis talk, one could have put as much effort into the spontaneous dominatrix session with her husband as with Frederick Lau’s involuntary encounter with a pineapple guillotine – a large part of the audience will certainly have to hold their hands in front of their eyes.
And of course we have to talk about advertising integrations again this time. Ultimately, Bora Dagtekin makes no secret of the fact that he is also a little proud of having become Germany’s one-man answer to product placement king James Bond: After McDonald’s in “Fack Ju Göhte 2”, “The Perfect Holiday” could easily have been renamed “Sixt – The Movie” – even if the car rental jokes don’t quite match the fire-breathing Samsung Galaxy punchlines “Chantal in Fairytale Land”. The repeated taunts against Ryanair are just as noticeable as the omnipresent Sixt inscriptions. A rogue who suspects that this is due to an unpleasant private flight experience by screenwriter Bora Dagtekin or a rejected cooperation.
Conclusion: In contrast to France, where the chaotic summer holiday comedy has a solid tradition, the genre has been (all too) neglected in this country in recent decades. Apparently a lot has built up that Bora Dagtekin is now letting out on behalf of all of us! “The Perfect Holiday” is always at its best when it ventures into Ballermann territory with club song cringe and takes aim at the (originally German) holiday culture. At the same time, the comedy loses more and more pace, especially in the last third, when the usual relationship boxes are negotiated in an increasingly emotional way.