No cash, no clothes save for the ones on his back, no family Bible. Jacob ( Jonas Holdenrieder) is packed off “to the Old Country” to find himself, and with the help of the genealogically-thorough family Bible, meet lost lost kin - a Mennonite uncle, for starters.īut being polite to this gorgeous Berliner ( Gizem Emre) in the taxi line leads to losing his “sack,” his luggage. In losing its nerve, it’s neither fish nor fowl, dramedy nor comedy, an is doomed to wander across your Netflix screen like a pilgrim in the comic/cosmic wilderness, a picture with a purpose, but no rewarding way of fulfilling it. But it’s too respectful and tentative to go all-in on mockery. This German film anchored among the Pennsylvania Amish but mostly-set in Berlin begins as a “fish out of water” comedy, lightly mocking the quaint Amish reactions to air travel, convertible cars and raves. “Rumspringa” follows this lad on that teenage walkabout amongst the sinful temptations of the modern world, and has just as much trouble figuring out who and what it is as he does. Today’s “Around the World with Netflix” film is a lot like its lead character, a young Amish man in search of his identity, his place in the world.
