Berlin Syndrome: A Film Review

Film Review: Berlin Syndrome

This movie was downright creepy. I watched it on Netflix and the blurb simply said something like: After a one night stand, things get sinister when she realizes there's no way out. 

It was a different type of scary. It was the realization throughout the entire movie that this could happen to anyone. This could happen to you. It made me think that he had seemed completely normal. He seemed like a good Samaritan, just chatting it up on the sidewalk.

I do believe that there were a few holes in the movie though. It didn't make sense why she would choose to go on a long walk with him just from meeting him on the sidewalk. There didn't seem to be a lot of chemistry between them, but maybe that's just because in the end, there wasn't supposed to be. 

The movie title confused me as well. 

I know Stockholm Syndrome is when you fall in love with your captor. 

Upon looking up the definition of Berlin Syndrome, the best I could get was that it was a childhood disease that often caused intellectual disabilities. This movie was based on a novel. Maybe the novel was better. This had some creepy sex elements, which while I understand could really happen, I was not expecting to watch in the light of day in my living room. It shows, pretty graphically, him tying her up, forcing himself on her... and the photo album he has of her with different words on her, different positions of her, with different amounts of clothes on. It's scary. It gets in your head, for sure.

My overall rating is 2.5 stars. It definitely could've been better (especially because now I know it was based off of a novel). It says rated R, but make sure you know you're in for some major nudity... major X rated shit. If you watch it, I hope you enjoy it more than I did (as much as anyone can enjoy watching someone stuggle like that).