"Late Show" is a German 105-minute movie from 1999, so it will soon have its 20th anniversary. The writer and director is the late Helmut Dietl and this is one of his most known works. After his big success with "Rossini" and "Schtonk" a bit earlier, this was probably a very eagerly awaited film and expectations must have been huge. When a man like Dietl makes a movie about the German television business with legendary show-masters Harald Schmidt and Thomas Gottschalk playing the main characters, then this has to evolve into something big right? Well, it did only to some extent I guess. Maybe the film really suffered from its expectations. But I enjoyed the watch, which is probably because I like the two I just mentioned, especially Schmidt and I am also a fan of Olli Dittrich, Karl Markovics and Dieter Pfaff who play minor characters in here, but still get a decent amount of screen time. Veronica Ferres I have never been a fan of and I don't think she is a good actress but I can look beyond her thanks to the people in here that I like.
The comedy is extremely dark here and there are no taboos in this movie. Harald Schmidt is excellent as a ruthless television executive who knows no friends, boundaries or shame when it comes to reaching high audience numbers. Same can be said about his assistant played by Jasmin Tabatabai and she received a German Film Award nomination for her portrayal. I think for the most part (especially the Schmidt scenes), this was a very good watch, but there were parts that did not entertain me too much too, so it's far from a great movie. These would include the characters of Orléans and Ferres mostly, even if the final scene at the show was okay with Gottschalk's character confessing his love to Orléans'. And I also liked the very last talk show scene which rang very true with animal documentaries being so human. Haha. Unfortunately, this film once again shows that Goottschalk just isn't a very gifted actor. This could have been much better with another more skilled performer instead of him. He is an outstanding host, no doubt about it and he single-handedly carried the most successful European television program for decades, but acting (as we know from his "Supernasen" films) may not be his biggest strength. But he is not bad enough either to destroy the film. I enjoyed and give it a thumbs-down, but like I said this has subjectively to do with my liking for many of the actors in here. If you don't appreciate them as much as I do, you probably could end up being bored or even annoyed here.
The comedy is extremely dark here and there are no taboos in this movie. Harald Schmidt is excellent as a ruthless television executive who knows no friends, boundaries or shame when it comes to reaching high audience numbers. Same can be said about his assistant played by Jasmin Tabatabai and she received a German Film Award nomination for her portrayal. I think for the most part (especially the Schmidt scenes), this was a very good watch, but there were parts that did not entertain me too much too, so it's far from a great movie. These would include the characters of Orléans and Ferres mostly, even if the final scene at the show was okay with Gottschalk's character confessing his love to Orléans'. And I also liked the very last talk show scene which rang very true with animal documentaries being so human. Haha. Unfortunately, this film once again shows that Goottschalk just isn't a very gifted actor. This could have been much better with another more skilled performer instead of him. He is an outstanding host, no doubt about it and he single-handedly carried the most successful European television program for decades, but acting (as we know from his "Supernasen" films) may not be his biggest strength. But he is not bad enough either to destroy the film. I enjoyed and give it a thumbs-down, but like I said this has subjectively to do with my liking for many of the actors in here. If you don't appreciate them as much as I do, you probably could end up being bored or even annoyed here.