Synopsis

The twelve-year-old Emil and his father are haunted by bad luck: first Emil's mother decamps for Canada, then his father is fired from work, and then, to add insult to injury, he's so excited about a new job offer that he has a car accident and loses his health and his license. But it gets even worse: to take a break from all those disasters, Emil is allowed to spend a few days with a friend of the family, the female priest Hummel in Berlin. In the train he runs across the slick Max Grundeis who anaesthetizes Emil and steals his savings of 1,500 DM. When he finally arrives in Berlin, Emil and a gang of street kids lead by the cheeky girl Pony Hütchen try to find the gangster, who haunts the posh Hotel Adlon as a hotel thief. Meanwhile, to prevent anyone from finding out about Emil's mishap, Gypsi, a member of the gang of kids, passes himself off as Emil, thus wreaking havoc on the home of the priest. Franziska Buch based "Emil und die Detektive" on the children's novel of the same name, written in 1928 by Erich Kästner. She manages a wonderful adaptation which sensitively preserves the core of the story, namely a strong sense of family and comradeship, but transports it to the 21^st century with the help of excellent actors. Much hip-hop music, stylish clothes, the use of cell phones and laptops creates an atmosphere of Berlin as a truly vibrant and modern metropolis.