Sys­tem Crasher

This debut nar­ra­tive fea­ture by Nora Fin­gschei­dt is as bold and con­fronta­tion­al as its sub­ject. Com­ing from a doc­u­men­tary back­ground, the direc­tor car­ried out con­sid­er­able research into ​‘sys­tem crash­ers,’ a label giv­en to chil­dren who bounce from home to home and gen­er­al­ly fall through the cracks of Germany’s fos­ter sys­tem. Nine-year-old Ben­ni (Hele­na Zen­gel) is one such child.

The film is fre­net­ic and vis­cer­al, with a score by John Gürtler that’s as intense and over­flow­ing with ener­gy as Ben­ni – her screams often match the clash­ing cym­bals on the sound­track, result­ing in a sym­pho­ny of rage. When she lash­es out, her vio­lence is often jar­ring to wit­ness, but Fingscheidt’s lens is nev­er on the side of judgement.

In fact, she doesn’t take sides at all in the tricky web that entan­gles our hero­ine. The direc­tor doesn’t seek to place blame on child ser­vices, their employ­ees, Benni’s moth­er or Ben­ni her­self. It is sim­ply the sto­ry of a child who wants to be wanted.

Zen­gel is raw and cap­ti­vat­ing in the lead. Her mag­net­ic blue eyes effort­less­ly engen­der empa­thy, though she’s cer­tain­ly not scared of con­fronta­tion. How­ev­er, it becomes increas­ing­ly dif­fi­cult to watch help­less­ly as those in charge of her care do their best, while more obsta­cles are cre­at­ed as her fits of vio­lent fury are direct­ed at oth­er chil­dren. As the tri­als Ben­ni faces become cycli­cal, we’re left to won­der what emo­tion­al toll this is tak­ing on the staff.

Fin­gschei­dt exem­pli­fies this through con­tem­pla­tive moments such as des­per­ate glances between car­ers, or Ben­ni bom­bard­ing her new school escort with triv­ial ques­tions like, ​“What’s your favourite colour?” – all impor­tant infor­ma­tion to a nine-year-old. Albrecht Schuch deliv­ers a ten­der per­for­mance as the patient and under­stand­ing Micha, the per­son on the receiv­ing end of Benni’s sweet inter­ro­ga­tion. He, like so many oth­ers, remains qui­et­ly frus­trat­ed he can’t do more for this lost child.

Sys­tem Crash­er is released dig­i­tal­ly on 27 March via Cur­zon Home Cin­e­ma, with oth­er VOD plat­forms to follow.