Anatomie 2 [2003]

A by-the-numbers sequel to the effective German medical horror movie. This shifts locales from Heidelberg to Berlin and brings back the original heroine [Franca Potente] in a cameo as a cop dedicated to rooting out the influence of the Anti-Hippocratic League in the medical profession. The new protagonist is an intern [Barnaby Matschurat] of humble origins who is determined to find some way to help his crippled brother, and catches the attention of a charismatic specialist [Herbert Knaup] who heads a teaching hospital's AHL lodge and uses his students as experimental subjects, implanting artificial muscles and administering addictive performance-enhancing drugs. The hero succumbs, seduced by blonde temptress Heike Makatsch and the prospect of being star of his soccer team, but realises he's just as likely to crack up as the rest of the subjects in the program.

Director-writer Stefan Rudowitsky, returning from the original, plays a more science-fictional game but is heavier-handed with both plot and characterisations, investing his hero with so much baggage that he see-saws between good and bad factions throughout [the good is represented by a Filipina nurse] while secondary characters have would-be spectacular meltdowns. There's an overdose of MTV cutting and snippet-montage, effective in conveying the relentless overwork of an intern but somehow less affecting in the superpowers-out-of-control or fight-on-the-rooftop business.
KIM NEWMAN

First published in this form here.

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