Do Fish Do It?

Jan is walking down the street lost in thought when Nina knocks him over on roller skates; she blows into his life and straight out again, then comes back. Nina is full of wild ideas, living with her brother, her father and her father’s new girlfriend, barely in touch with her mother; her closest friend and stand-in mother is Angel, whose own daughter disappeared years ago. The two of them fall for each other, and here is the thing the record’s summary never mentions: Jan is living with HIV, contracted through a blood transfusion. Almut Getto does not turn that fact into melodrama; she carries first love, the difficulty of growing up and the question of whether fish have sex with the same lightness, and places the virus inside that life rather than above it. Sophie Rogall was nominated for the German Film Award for the part, with Tino Mewes as Jan.