Mother's Day (1994) User Reviews (8)

Perhaps the only time an Austrian movie reached the greatness of British humor

[Superunknovvn · 8/10 · 9 May 2007]

After just watching "Muttertag" again for the first time in years I am stunned by how great it really is. Almost every line of dialog has become a classic catchphrase. You know the movie by heart, because it's getting quoted all the time in Austria - and rightly so! "Muttertag" is not just hilariously absurd, it's also an accurate portrayal of the people living in Vienna's suburbs with all their typical quirks.

Alfred Dorfer, Andreas Nowak, Roland Düringer, Eva Billisich and Andrea Händler play various roles and they all play them to perfection. Düringer and Dorfer, of course, went on to become the most popular Austrian comedians, starred in a lot of other movies and even managed to put a successful sitcom on Austrian television. However, they never achieved the greatness of this movie again and no other Austrian comedy ever did.

"Muttertag" is really a fluke. It has influenced a whole generation and will always remain a classic. Can someone in Austria please make another movie as original and funny as this one?

Best comedy ever

[r_sz · 9/10 · 8 January 2004]

If you don't know the place where this film is set, if you don't know the people you might not understand or like it. Almost every line of this movie is legendary, brilliant performances by Düringer and Dorfer each one playing multiple characters.

bleeding souls

[the_stardogg · 10/10 · 13 April 2005]

I can think of only one other Austrian movie (or German, for that matter) that dives so deep into social deserts and black parts of the common human, and that is "Hundstage", which could easily be described as "social porn" and is equivalent to Todd Solondz' work, yet darker and more dire. In Muttertag, it's more satire, but with many more levels, and none of them pleasant. You live with a group of people from a lower social level, the Neugebauers in the center of this strange and wicked community, living in a notorious apartment estate in Vienna. Their part of town is satirically portrayed like one of the antechambers of hell - for Austrian standards - a socialistic community of concrete and locked doors, where everybody tries to seclude himself and his dark secrets from everyone else. No Walzer, no Mozart, no Viennese courtesy, no post-monarchistic postcard nostalgia and no hope. Everyday life seems to throw everything at the Neugebauers to bring them down, and everything unfolds right before Mother's Day, which provides a certain forced traditional background for this tour-de-force, like Christmas being a battlefield for family conflicts. And just like at Christmas the private tension induces riot-like scenes in the community, in the supermarket, at church, at the gas station and in school. Satirical portrait with some of the finest Austrian comedians and actors, that will offer a haunting, outlandish and desperate experience for non-Austrians and a mirror of the soul for the locals. Remember, people of Vienna, "another social layer" does not mean that these people aren't living nearby, and their issues apply to you as well, regardless of your social and educational background.

Hits international standards.

[michael-37 · 12 February 2001]

The dramatic last act of this film is - by actors, camera und script - even better than the breakdown of Michael Douglas in Falling Down. The concept of using each actor for a couple of characters makes this film even a hide-and-seek-game for the audience. Visiting the original places in vienna (or similar elsewhere) makes you sure, that most of the story ist real, though its satyrical.

A normal Mother's Day in a housing estate in Vienna....

[PuppetMa · 10/10 · 20 February 1999]

In a housing estate in Vienna everyone prepares for the first Sunday in May. Everybody knows everybody, and everybody knows everybody's dirty little secrets. A boy prepares an electronic knife for his mother to cut herself in the stomach, the grandfather donates all the familiy's money to the WWF and the father's sidestep comes to light.

Beside the film "Indien" "Muttertag" is an Austrian cult-film. Hopefully "Muttertag" will not be synchronized for Germany like they did with "Indien".....(perhaps subtitles would do :))) )

One of the finest Films of Sicheritz

[vonhesperus · 10/10 · 9 March 2024]

Truly an Austrian Comedy with lots of social statements inside. Black Humor paired with excellent acting by Dorfer, Düringer and the others. You also should see "Indien" with Dorfer und Hader, even better than "Muttertag" if you like this sort of humor / social view. Austrian movies, comedies, mostly are also a deep view inside of the society we life in. Dependable on the plot, the "simple" people or the "High Society", but always with much truth in the exaggerated charackters, which are sometimes can be found exactly that way on the streets. Psycological inside is always part of these movies, nonetheless Austria was home of Freud, Adler, Watzlawick... so enjoy the loughs and take the "hints for a better life" :)

As absurd as forgettable

[Horst_In_Translation · 4/10 · 4 August 2016]

"Muttertag" or "Mother's Day" is an Austrian German-language film from 1993, so 2 more years and this one will have its 25th anniversary. The director is Harald Sicheritz and he is also one of the four writers who came up with this film. The other three are the late Peter Berecz and successful actors Alfred Dorfer and Roland Düringer. These two of course also play major characters in here. The film runs for 95 minutes and centers around the important day mentioned in the title. Or does it really? This is where the problems already start. Of course I knew that this would not be a film like an American comedy about this day like there is one about "Valentine's Day" for example, but I at least thought there would be an obvious reference to Mother's Day from start to finish. There is not and honestly, with some slightly different writing, this movie could have been about any special day of the year.

While I felt that the film started somewhat interestingly and I developed some interest in the characters, I must say that things went south pretty quickly. It was probably before the 40-minute mark already that the characters all felt so absurd and over the top that I basically had no interest anymore in what would happen to them or to the plot. Very randomly, in-between, they include a couple music performance and songs about mothers. I have seen other work by Sicheritz before, but I must say this is the worst I have seen from him so far. I am absolutely clueless why his movies are so well-respected nowadays and I can only shake my head at this film's current IMDb rating of 8.1. Neither the story, nor the acting nor any other aspect about this one is entertaining or smart. 4 out of 10 is still pretty generous and I highly recommend to stay far far away from this one.

greatest austrian film!

[pse · 10 April 2000]

well, what can you say about this film? it's best to see it 'cause you can't describe it! but i'll try: the film takes place in vienna on mother's day. the family doesn't want to celebrate this day but thinks they have to and the mother doesn't want them to do but nobody tells the others. so there's a lot of trouble that ends in a little chaos - not as bad as "hinterholz 8".

the actors are the best from the austrian comedy has and in this film the product is the best ever done in austria. really funny (even when you don't like the viennese dialect!). it seems to be a copy of life there - so don't trust these guys ;-)