Mit Burnout durch den Wald (2014)

Six patients suffering from burnout set off with their therapist, Hannah, for a four-day outdoor therapy retreat in Märkische Schweiz, Brandenburg. First, there is Silvia, a single mother and teacher who tries to compensate for the stress of everyday life with a shopping addiction and is already on the verge of a sudden hearing loss. Then there is Johann, a restless management consultant who mistakes efficiency and profit maximization for the meaning of life. Johann is a workaholic who, by his own account, has no weaknesses whatsoever, and he is only along because his boss and his assistant forced him to come. Now he also has to share a room with Silvia, the frustrated teacher. The two can’t stand each other, yet they can’t deny a certain attraction. Long-term unemployed Alfred, meanwhile, blames the capitalist system and people like Johann for society’s exhaustion, and as the film goes on, he tries to open Johann’s eyes—with a hard punch in the face. Alfred has to share a room with Rosa, which suits him—having been left by his wife—much better than it suits Rosa. Perpetually indecisive and underpaid, Rosa is a long-term intern who jumps from one short-term contract to the next. She is only 26 and already completely burned out. Instead of finding fulfillment in art, as she always wanted to, she works for an advertising agency, trying to make unhealthy, full-fat chocolate appealing to overweight children. She has trouble making decisions, both at work and in her relationships. And last but not least, the mismatched retired couple Herbert and Gudrun are also joining the therapeutic outdoor trip. While the mildly depressed Gudrun is basically just waiting for death to arrive, Herbert wants to finally enjoy his retirement and really let loose. Much to Gudrun’s bewilderment, he has already secretly bought a motorhome so he can travel the world in it. As the trip goes on, Hannah, the overly optimistic therapist, finds that her six stressed-out patients are real tough cases. She soon realizes that the standard methods she has learned from stress research are reaching their limits: hiking together through peaceful nature, building a bridge to strengthen teamwork, camping in the wilderness, and reflecting on what really matters through a sleep-deprivation therapy don’t seem to be doing much good this time. The mismatched patients barely cooperate. They keep connecting with their ordinary lives by phone or computer, accidentally set their tents on fire, and increasingly evade Hannah’s supervision as the therapy progresses. So Herbert goes for a spin on a moped, Johann and Silvia go shopping, Alfred treats himself to a beer at a beach bar, and Rosa arranges a date in the next village. Ultimately, it is the patients themselves who, more or less, end up treating one another on this trip: they listen to each other, grow closer, take one another’s problems seriously, and don’t expose each other’s weaknesses. Although their different life paths lead to repeated clashes, the protagonists do try to put themselves in one another’s shoes and accept one another as people. And when Johann, who has already fired numerous employees with great zeal in his consulting job, finally becomes the victim of a cost-cutting measure himself and is told over the phone that his services are no longer required, even this passionate advocate of the performance-driven society realizes that things aren’t as simple as he always makes them out to be. In the end, Herbert and Gudrun decide they would rather spend the final stage of their lives apart. Shopping-addicted Silvia, meanwhile, finds a new partner and househusband in the freshly fired number-cruncher Johann of all people, who might bring a little order back into her life—and her overdrawn bank account. Rosa takes long-term unemployed Alfred’s advice to heart and takes a sabbatical year instead of continuing to let unscrupulous employers exploit her. Alfred, for his part, finally looks back to his student days, when he worked as a taxi driver. Rather than keep handing out flyers in the pedestrian zone dressed as a hot dog, as the job center had demanded, he gets back in a taxi and meets all sorts of interesting people. He also runs into Rosa again and finds out what she is planning to do now. Although the patients are not completely at peace with themselves by the end, they have become a little wiser. By the end of this rather strenuous trip, however, therapist Hannah is in need of therapy herself. She had advised her patients not to expect so much of themselves or of life, so they would not be disappointed so quickly; but, as Johann points out, her own expectation of curing six cases of burnout in just four days may have been a little too ambitious. It is no wonder, then, that such extremely high expectations end in her becoming overwhelmed herself.