Herrliche Zeiten aka Outsmarted, based on the novel by Thor Kunkel - 9 out of 10

Herrliche Zeiten aka Outsmarted, based on the novel by Thor Kunkel
9 out of 10


This is a very original, creative, most often amusing, splendidly acted, definitely worth watching, sometimes - correction: most often - bizarre German comedy.

Oliver Masucci is outstanding as Doctor Claus Muller - Todt, a surgeon who transforms himself into a monster, a very complex character, played with aplomb, zest, vigor and formidable talent.
Claus and his wife, Evi aka equally skilled Katja Riemann, are very wealthy, he drives a Porsche, they have a stupendous garden and the house is probably worth a few million dollars.

They live next door to Mohamed, a prince that seems to have much in common with the now infamous MBS aka Mohamed Ben Salman, the Saudi crown prince who has ordered but denies it the execution followed by the dismemberment of a journalist he did not like, the late Jamal Khashoggi.
When he sees an extravagant group of guests at the residence of the Arab neighbor, Claus writes an ad that will be printed and will attract the attention of a peculiar circus of people, dressed in leather, with the paraphernalia of the BDSM crowd, chains, masks, scaring poor Evi, when she sees the, gathered at her door.

Claus claims it was all a mistake, although his future downfall, monstrous decay may prove that on the contrary, perhaps unconsciously, he had been looking for the slaves he advertised in the paper.
However, after the episode with the crowd of weirdoes, there is a more subdued, apparently serious, reserved, calm, professional individual in front of the couple, offering his services as a more nuanced, figurative slave.

He presents his case with conviction, talent, in a  persuasive manner, mentioning that he has lost everything, a bank takes whatever money he makes, if it is a small or big income notwithstanding, and he is thus keen on taking a job where he doesn't want pay, what is the use, since it is confiscated anyway, but satisfaction.
He is called Bartos and he would very much like to offer his services and find pleasure in caring for the Muller-Todt family.

They try it and for some time it is Absolute Heaven.
Nirvana!

This man knows how to make the most exquisite, unheard of dishes.
Deserts that sound like they are out of The Arabian Tales.

Cherries with mint, grilled peaches with chocolate cream...I am making this up, for I don't recall the names.

He is placing flowers everywhere, petal sin the bath that he has ready, using all the time white gloves and an expertise that is sublime.
Furthermore, he brings along a beautiful wife that can offer splendid massages, special treatments from the island of Java - was it? - assistance in the sauna, where she is at her most erotic...

Bartos then offers his wife to Claus!

They all attend a grotesque party at the prince next door, with an orgy of sex, abuse, humiliation and offense.
By this time though, the doctor is no longer a decent intellectual, albeit he recoiled at some of the killings, torture that the tyrant in the making is proud to confess to and show in pictures.

Claus is about to become a monster.
The comedy is thus in part a lesson, a meditation on odeon slavery, incomes that keep people in misery and squalor, the abhorrent indifference of many,  out of the super rich.