The Coming Days (2010)

Die kommenden Tage is the story of an upper middle-class Berlin family on their personal journey from the present day into a near future, a journey into a time of uncertainty and grave changes. Due to a rare antibody reaction, Laura Kuper has to choose between her desire to have children and Hans, the love of her life. Her sister Cecilia is driven into the abyss of a newly developing terrorist movement by her unreturned love to Konstantin. And then there is Philip, the youngest child of the family, pulled into a hopeless war for Germany for the few remaining oilfields of Asia. A destabilized family tackles a destabilized world, entering their future with all their hopes and fears.

This is not your typical sci-fi glimpse-of-the-future movie. No gleaming humanoid robots, no laser beams, no problems solved. Instead, this movie tries to portray the next ten years in terms that may be familiar to you if you are interested in "doomer" literature and movies. If not, get ready for a rough ride: resource depletion and consequent resource wars along with overpopulation and people seeking shelter in seemingly more secure countries (in this case, Germany) makes for an explosive mixture, witnessed through the eyes of various people. Some of them play an active part in what unfolds, others are mere onlookers and, sometimes, victims.

The future still brings some technological advancement, albeit in smaller scale than say, the ultimate AI or above-mentioned robots. Instead, they are shown only in passing, which makes them even more impressive: automated traffic that doesn't stop at intersections, e-newspaper and a small garden for growing pepper under the kitchen counter. All of this in contrast with a city falling rapidly apart, trash flooding the streets, all lawns used for camping by immigrants and other homeless people.

Highly recommended, especially if you like movies like "Children of Men". The only (small) drawback for me was that this one here is too strongly focused on the individual tragedies, and maybe too many of them to give the greater political image some space to unfold. It certainly is there, but much more is implied than actively said or done. Nevertheless, it is excellently done, well-acted and may give you some food for thought.

IMDB Reviewer