Kebab sauce on the table, macho behavior and a good helping of old-fashioned jokes: One can only hope that the Munich homicide squad was fictionalized in “Police Call 110: Until Midnight”.

It is precisely in this pile of men that Chief Detective Elisabeth Eyckhoff (Verena Altenberger) is transferred and everyone just calls it "Bessie".

Eyckhoff doesn't even have to look for the murderer, because Jonas (Thomas Schubert) is already handcuffed in the interrogation room.

He killed a woman and stabbed another woman in the back twelve times with a knife.

What is this crime thriller about now, one wonders when, after just under twenty minutes, the crime is shown and the motive is psychologically classified.

Jonas, in a colorful knitted granny sweater, loves to hear himself talking and is probably what comes out when screenwriter Tobias Kniebe invents a “highly intelligent psychopath”.

The result is a woman-hating incel who really just wants someone to listen.

There is no evidence

The only thing the officials lack is proof. If Jonas cannot be persuaded to confess by midnight, he will be released. The perpetrator also seems to know that. He gives lengthy lectures to the Commissioner on women or, as he puts it, 'women'. So the crime thriller develops into a duel in which Jonas and "Bessie" beat the lines of dialogue around the ears. There are two hours until midnight at the beginning of the interrogation thriller, which is told almost in real time - and the clock is ticking.

The bunch of men is watching from the next room and is dissatisfied with Eykhoff's "cuddling course". Curses are cursed, people hit the desk in frustration - a mistake, and the suspect is released. The frustration now also hits “Bessie”, who wants to be withdrawn from the interrogation. Service manager Schaub (Christian Baumann) still has an ace up his sleeve: The “most successful interrogator this agency has ever had” - Josef Murnauer (Michael Roll), an old warrior in a coat and hat. Hardly has he been spending some time with his daughter - apparently for the first time in ages - when his phone rings: Munich needs him. “Do you have a helipad?” Asks Murnauer. When the legendary investigator then looks over the sleeping city from above, the spectator knows that the man has a mission. As soon as he arrived, the staff call him “Boss”.Expectations are high when Murnauer arrives at the interrogation room. On the other hand, Eyckhoff (and the audience) were disappointed that Murnauer's methods were limited to sleight of hand and rumor.

“Until midnight” is a crime thriller without the classic search for perpetrators. The film draws tension from the power struggle among the police officers. Eyckhoff and the bunch of men engage in a bitter fight over who is right, and for this they even violate service regulations. The men simply fail to take the young colleague seriously. If she gets loud, she should “take a deep breath”, is only accepted by the public prosecutor (Birge Schade), who integrates herself into the macho group while smoking cigarettes.

Verena Altenberger carries “Until Midnight” with her convincing acting performance as “Bessie” Eyckhoff, with quiet mind games in the interrogation room, power struggle behind the scenes and breakdowns in the toilet.

“Until midnight” is a “police call” that nobody wants to be, and at the same time it is proof that even one and a half hours of dialogue in a Munich police station can make a good crime thriller.

The

police

call

110:

This Sunday at 8:15 p.m. on the first one runs

until midnight

.