Rumspringa
By Jennifer Green,
Common Sense Media Reviewer
Common Sense Media Reviewers
Amish-in-Berlin tale has language, sex, male friendship.
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Rumspringa
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What's the Story?
A young Amish man (Jonas Holdenrieder) is sent to Berlin ostensibly to uncover his family's history but really to discover himself in RUMSPRINGA. The film's title is the name of the traditional period of exploration allotted to Amish youth before they commit to a life in the community. In Berlin, Jacob (Holdenrieder) loses his suitcase in some momentary confusion upon meeting the attractive Ina (Gizem Emre), then meets local student Alf (Timur Bartels), who begrudgingly offers him a room in his flat. Everything in Alf's world is eye-opening to Jacob, and Jacob's Amish ways are inconceivable to his new urban friends. What they'll discover is how much they have to learn from each other.
Is It Any Good?
There's a lot of fodder and several funny and heartwarming moments in this movie, but some scenarios are too farfetched and others overly contrived. Elements of the humor in Rumspringa also fail to land (or maybe just to translate). Holdenrieder is believable enough as the earnest, wide-eyed young Amish man in Berlin, and his mutually educational relationship with Alf is heartwarming as they go from bros to brothers. The emotional bonding of the male friendship is definitely the highlight of the film, while Alf's and Jacob's romantic relationships with Freya and Ina feel more like plot devices. Uninteresting secondary characters, like roommate Mr. Bo, could've been cut to make room for more of the primary relationships.
Flashbacks to Jacob's life in Pennsylvania help explain his behavior, but some actions, like a radical haircut or stealing Alf's car, feel too far out of character. As Alf and Ina quickly discover, Jacob's simple, structured worldview offers much calm in their scattered modern lives. When a pretentious art collector calls his Amish background impressively "authentic," it sums up the lack of identity and purpose so many seem to feel in contemporary society, and which Jacob -- whose purpose he says is to "be a good person" -- has in spades. As such, it feels somewhat contradictory that Jacob keeps extending his year abroad, but the connections he makes and the awakenings he experiences are largely depicted as sweet and a natural part of growing up that he might otherwise have missed.
Talk to Your Kids About ...
Families can talk about the concept of the Rumspringa. How would you describe it? Do other cultures have similar rites of passage that you can think of?
Do you agree with the decisions Jacob makes? Why, or why not?
How does the film draw comparisons between different contemporary lifestyles? Can you think of any scenes in particular that used camera movements or colors to represent ideas about characters?
Movie Details
- On DVD or streaming: April 29, 2022
- Cast: Jonas Holdenrieder, Timur Bartels, Gizem Emre
- Director: Mira Thiel
- Studio: Netflix
- Genre: Comedy
- Topics: Friendship
- Run time: 101 minutes
- MPAA rating: NR
- Last updated: February 17, 2023
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