Days that last

For a long time now, all was not well with the Dewenter family. While mother Andrea (Lena Stolze) was able to make a name for herself as an author, father Christian (Götz Schubert) plunged into an affair with cellist Laura (Tessa Mittelstaedt). Son Lars (Max Riemelt) has escaped the parental home and is trying his hand as an actor in Berlin with little success. And daughter Elaine (Mathilde Bundschuh) lives out her adolescence to the fullest together with her best friend Merle (Lucie Hollmann). Harmonious togetherness is simply non-existent in this family. But when Andrea dies in a car accident, the rest of the family is forced to pull together and put their own difficulties on the back burner. It's a difficult task for Christian, Lars and Elaine to overcome.

With Days That Remain, director and screenwriter Pia Strietmann attempts to tackle a very difficult subject with a mixture of tragedy and absurd comedy. In doing so, it was important to her to capture a moment that is almost never dealt with in films: the time between the death of a loved one and the funeral. All the things that want to get done in that short period of time, the family dynamics that take on completely new traits in the process, the coping with grief, all of that is usually withheld from the viewer.

It is to Strietmann's credit that she has attempted to imbue this enormously depressing situation, which everyone has witnessed or will witness in their lives, with a certain lightness that allows the viewer to break out in a relieved laugh at times. In doing so, she draws humor from the absurdity of everyday life. With a very authentic look at things, the production feels refreshingly honest and the joke never strained or out of place.

Borne by an excellent ensemble of actors, Days That Remain is a truly impressive feature film debut. However, the drama is really not light fare, despite the staging being stripped of its crushing melancholy. There are always scenes that come across a bit ponderous or even unwieldy. And the rather dull imagery doesn't necessarily help to lift the viewer's spirits either. But some wonderful moments, like the final scene between Christian and Lars, lift the film again above good TV level and make Tage, die bleiben a real recommendation for all who appreciate sophisticated German dramas. Worth seeing

An article by Frankfurt-Tipp