15/02/2025 - BERLINALE 2025: Sarah Miro Fischer delivers a well-executed debut feature on the internal and external turmoil that plays out when one close to you is accused of something terrible

Fresh out of the German Film and Television Academy Berlin (DFFB), debuting director Sarah Miro Fischer jumps directly into the 75th Berlinale’s prized Panorama sidebar with steady, relevant drama The Good Sister [+see also:
interview: Sarah Miro Fischer & Marie …
film profile], – her self-assured DFFB graduation film – about a young woman responding to accusations of rape against her older brother. With a screenplay by Miro Fischer and Agnes Maagaard Petersen, the movie calls into question how our contemporary legal systems handle such cases – and the traumatic complexities that come with having your worldview and opinion of someone close to you come under interrogation.

Just out of a failed relationship and kicked out of her ex-girlfriend’s flat, medical worker Rose (Marie Bloching) moves in with her older brother Samuel (Anton Weil), immediately striking up the close rapport they’ve held since they were children. But when her beloved Sami is accused of rape by another woman, Elisa (Laura Balzer), and she is called to testify, Rose doesn’t know how to respond. Pulled into the case concerning her brother, she’s forced to confront everything she has taken for granted while deciding how to proceed – as a sister, woman and partial aural witness to the assault.

Miro Fischer is less concerned about the idiosyncrasies of legal proceedings and more concerned with the emotional response of those around the accused. First, who does one believe when one has been shown something different one’s entire life, and second, how does one come to terms with this new reality without betraying oneself? DoP Selma von Polheim Gravsen brings to the table a balance between steady and handheld camera that conveys the conflicted emotional state of our protagonist, played by a sometimes bubbly and sometimes fraught, but perpetually nuanced, Bloching. She must often convey Rose's current state of mind with just a raise of the eyebrows or twitch of the mouth, leaving marginal room for interpretation in a sea of thoughts left unspoken.

While Rose tries to maintain a sense of normalcy, the reverberating effects of the incident begin to penetrate other aspects of her life. This includes her interest in a man she meets during a drawing class and her relationships with others, which begin to take on unexpected dimensions as she struggles to make sense of her world anew. In this tight and well-thought-through debut, Miro Fischer succinctly shows how we have yet to understand how best to speak openly about incidents of trauma when they are inflicted by those close to us – we would rather remain tight-lipped than courageously confrontational.

The Good Sister is a German-Spanish production by DFFB, Potsdam’s Arkanum Pictures and Madrid’s Nephilim Productions. Warsaw-based New Europe Film Sales has taken the reins on the film’s world sales.