Fairy tale books and Laurin's mother's belongings are seen from the outside as being of fetishistic importance by her, but we are only privy to a couple fantastical visions of her mother's apparitions while expressionistic scenes of the prowling killer and his victims appear to happen outside of her perspective (including her mother stumbling upon the killer disposing of one of his victims). Beneath the period gothic detail, Laurin is more akin to the realism of the Australian Celia than the more surreal Czech Valerie and Her Week of Wonders, establishing Laurin's tendency to escape into fantasy but focusing more externally on the real world around her with a bitter grandmother, a lonely mother, a father with wanderlust, Stefan's man-hunting mother ( Kati Sir), and an intolerant pastor. The directorial debut of German filmmaker Robert Sigl, Laurin falls into a seventies and eighties genre category of adult horrors scene through the eyes of a child along that encompasses films ranging from Lemora, A Child's Tale of the Supernatural and Lady in White to the likes of The Reflecting Skin and even Silver Bullet (of which the film contains some subtle parallels). When Stefan subsequently vanishes into the night on the way home from a play date with Laurin however, her own natural curiosity may make her the killer's next target even if she does not realize it. Left in the care and to care for her ailing grandmother Olga ( Mephisto's Hédi Temessy), Laurin becomes too infatuated with a replacement father figure in new teacher Van Rees ( Károly Eperjes), the son of the fire and brimstone-spouting pastor ( Endre Kátay) to pay much heed to the suspicions voiced by fellow classmate Stefan (future award-winning Hungarian writer/director Barnabás Tóth), the subject of much bullying by their classmates (and possibly by their teacher).

Young, highly-imagintive Laurin ( Dóra Szinetár) may have seen one of the victims, or it might have been a nightmare in any case, the seemingly accidental drowning death of her mother Flora ( Brigitte Karner) in the windswept night on the way back from seeing off her sailor husband Arne ( The Turin Horse's János Derzsi) preoccupies her mind. Max Ophüls Award: Robert Sigl (nominee) - Max Ophüls FestivalĪ killer of children stalks the streets of a German village at the turn of the century.

Bavarian Film Award (Best Young Direction): Robert Sigl (winner) - Bavarian Film Awards, 1989

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