Karla | German Film Festival 2026
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https://germanfilmfestival.com.au/films/ger26-karla
Date Reviewed: 06/05/2026
Karla begins with Karla running away. But what begins as a retreat from her family becomes a journey toward justice.
Karla is dominated by and surrounded by everything she encounters. Her new home, the adult characters she speaks to, and even the corridors she walks through loom over the small girl with silent authority. She is almost always positioned beneath, below, or behind something that diminishes her in comparison to others. This is conveyed superbly by Elise Krieps as 12 year old Karla. She is measured and patient in portraying a child who has been immeasurably damaged by her experiences with her father.
The Judge, Richter Lamy, is a calm and stabilising force for both Karla and the audience. He provides a narrative voice that steadily moves the film forward. His gentle empathy and understanding help Karla slowly begin to process and move through her deep trauma.
Karla gradually comes to understand that simply telling the truth is not enough; you must explain and justify your truth for it to become accepted as public truth and justice. Evidence of her father’s crimes slowly emerges, and she begins to open up more to Judge Lamy. The film masterfully blends Karla’s fantasy world, memories, trauma, and lived experiences, demonstrating how victims of this kind of personal trauma do not separate their experiences from reality. Instead, it becomes part of who they are. Karla struggles passionately to separate her victimhood from her identity, something demonstrated through her reliance on music as a coping mechanism.
The film takes an hour and fifteen minutes to plainly state, “The charge in question is rape”, because the film is not about the act itself. It is about the betrayal of a father against his daughter and the effects of his unforgivable crimes against her. She seeks recognition as much as justice for these crimes.
Her father is not represented as a powerful man, but instead as a weak thug unable to maintain control; his verbal threats appear childish and pathetic. In the second half of the film, the camera shifts to an under the desk view of Karla; she is now in control. Her musical devices, which she constantly plays with, give her focus and agency. She is now conducting the music and controlling the narrative through her testimony against her father.
Karla is a superb film that explores a specific case through fascinating and intelligent filmmaking. My only wish would have been for a wider lens: a deeper examination of why and how this kind of violence occurs, and the privileged position some men hold purely because of their gender. The film is about surviving deep trauma and ends with the shocking statistics that “one in eight children (12.7%) have been sexually abused by their 18th birthday” and “in Europe, 1 in 5 children are victims of sexual violence.” Karla is a powerful film about recognising what these statistics look like in human terms.
Reviewed by Nicolas Van Der Haar