Club Las Piranjas (1995)

A “promising” promotional video for the “Club Las Piranjas” hotel lures all kinds of characters from Germany to the holiday resort of the same name, located in latitudes that speak an ill-defined “southern, exotic” language, far from any civilization. Biggi and Edwin are the club’s two entertainers, responsible for organizing the holiday. The Schadletzki family, consisting of Karl-Heinz Schadletzki, his wife Hildegard, and their son Oliver, plan to spend their summer vacation without Grandma Schadletzki and her dog, Uschi. Grandma loses the boxer Uschi at the airport as soon as they arrive and unsuccessfully asks the airport announcer to call for him, since the dog has already smuggled himself aboard as a stowaway. A mixed German tour group, including the family mentioned above, the North Hessian pensioner Herta Ludwig (“My Home is in Kassel,” a play on the saying “My home is my castle”), as well as Margot Kemper, a department head traveling alone, and Kurt Becker, a branch manager, reach their destination two and a half hours late. After landing somewhere in the middle of nowhere, the holiday-minded package tourists are noisily welcomed by the two exuberant entertainers, Biggi and Edwin. The club, which they finally reach at night after a several-hour bus ride through a lunar landscape (promoted by Edwin as “the green lung of the South”), looks, as far as can be made out in the glaring light of the spotlights on the barbed-wire fence, like some kind of maximum-security prison built by a totalitarian state on a military training ground. Immediately after their late arrival at the club, the hungry guests are told by the club’s manager, Dr. Renate Wenger, that the kitchen is closed. All guests must also hand in their valuables and identity papers at reception, and are given a “club uniform” and “Piranha tokens” to use as the resort’s in-house currency. Over the course of the film, the guests face various problems, such as a broken swimming pool, timed breakfasts with guests assigned to dining groups, faulty toilet flushes, and double-booked rooms. The latter, however, turned out to be intentional—to the great displeasure of the vacationers affected—because there was a booking option called “single as double.” This meant that two solo travelers of the same sex had to share a double room. While Biggi and Edwin ignore these problems or try to gloss over them, the club manager, Dr. Wenger, who clearly has a drinking problem, is no real person for the guests to turn to either. Participation in club activities is also compulsory. Guests have to join in group beach cleanups (under the slogan “Operation Clean Beach”), play dodgeball to get to know one another, and attend themed evenings and party nights. Biggi and Edwin constantly try to keep the guests together and entertain them, which increasingly gets on some of their nerves. At some point, a number of guests reach the limit of what they can put up with; the first begin thinking about escape. One evening, the Schadletzki family wants to leave the club grounds for a few hours to get away from the stress and explore the area. But the hotel’s camp-like security and remote location thwart their outing. Biggi catches the Schadletzki family during their “attempted outing,” wants to tell Edwin about it, and goes to his room. When she opens his door, she sees Edwin and Dr. Wenger asleep in bed together. Biggi feels hurt because she was in love with Edwin. The next day, the group goes on the “Land and People” excursion, also called “Sand and People,” which ends in the middle of a desolate ruin in the desert. There, Herta and Karl-Heinz hatch an escape plan. Since the guests’ valuables and travel documents are kept in the safe, Karl-Heinz is to charm Biggi, whom the two have picked as an easy target. They believe Biggi can get them access to the office, where the safe is. At Belgian Night—or Persian Night; this verbal mix-up stems from Dr. Wenger’s alcohol-induced slurring—Karl-Heinz asks Biggi to dance and flirts with her. The two entertainers foil Herta and Karl-Heinz’s scheme. The tip came from Margot, who wanted to get back at Kurt out of jealousy, since the drunk Dr. Wenger had fallen in love with him. The guests, the manager, and the two entertainers sleep off their drunkenness; Herta enjoys the night alone in a large bed. The film ends aboard the plane carrying the passengers back home—but in the final scene, Edwin and Biggi are seen sitting in the cockpit, laughing.