Spieleabend (2024)

Pia and Jan meet in the park while walking their dogs. Pia is a photographer, and Jan owns a bicycle shop. The two become a couple. At a regular games night, Jan meets Pia’s circle of friends. Pia’s best friend is Karo, a trained designer who runs a mail-order furniture business and is married to Oliver, a vocational school teacher. Sheila is a pharmacist; she has known Pia, like Karo, since kindergarten. She stalks her ex-girlfriend, but claims it is “only” a long break in their relationship. Kurt, a long-term student, is Karo’s brother. The games night takes place at Karo and Oliver’s villa. Karo wants Pia to join her company as a designer, not least because she doesn’t think Pia’s and Jan’s businesses are lucrative. Jan wants to make a good impression at the games night. As a gift for Karo, he brings her an airbag for cycling, which immediately comes loose and ruins Karo’s hairstyle. Jan goes to find a quiet room to call his friend Alex and opens a window there. Oliver’s cockatoo, whom he calls Helmut Kohl, escapes through it. Jan asks Alex to catch the bird. In the process, Alex destroys Oliver’s play tower in the garden. Karo and Oliver have an au pair, Gabriela, who looks after their daughter Emma and prepares the food. During the evening, Pia’s ex-boyfriend, Matthias, a dentist, also turns up. He repeatedly tries to make Jan look foolish, and casually tells everyone about his marriage proposal to Pia. Jan knew nothing about Matthias or his proposal; it meant nothing to Pia, and she had not accepted it. Jan has brought the game “Who Would …,” in which questions are drawn from a stack and everyone has to write down the name of someone in the group. Oliver loses his temper because he feels the others are making him out to be a loser. Afterward, he dresses up as the all-powerful elf king Ogandur. Karo thinks he has made both himself and her look ridiculous in front of their friends. The two get into an argument, during which it comes out that they are not having sex and that Karo has to take medication to function. Karo accuses Oliver of having an affair with Gabriela. After Jan calls Matthias a bigmouth, Matthias challenges him to a table tennis duel. At Karo’s suggestion, they play naked. The loser has to drink a bottle of chili sauce. Matthias says he can’t tolerate spicy food. He is confident he will win, but loses the duel. After drinking the chili sauce, Jan hands Matthias a bottle of milk, which turns out to be breast milk. Eventually, Jan and Pia argue. She feels like a trophy in the duel between Jan and Matthias. Jan, meanwhile, accuses her of not belonging in her world of the rich and intelligent. He also finds out that Matthias and Pia kissed, although Pia says it was before she and Jan were really together. Jan leaves the villa with Alex, but Alex has lost his keys, so they have to go back. They end up in a net trap that neighbor Fieper has set up in his garden for wild boars. Pia accuses Oliver of inviting Matthias and of drawing only the Trivial Pursuit cards Matthias had prepared for. Oliver wanted to help Matthias get back together with Pia. Meanwhile, Matthias, drunk, drives toward the Berlin Zoological Garden, and Oliver, Karo, Pia, and Sheila follow him later. Fieper frees Jan and Alex from the trap and gives them the cockatoo, which he has tranquilized with a shot. Jan brings Helmut Kohl back into the house, but by then only Kurt is there. Jan, Alex, and Kurt also drive to the zoo. They find Matthias’s phone in a tiger enclosure, and Jan climbs in because he thinks Matthias may be there too. Matthias later turns up outside the enclosure, however. Pia and Jan make up, as do Karo and Oliver. Oliver tells Karo that he had secretly taken dance lessons from Gabriela for their wedding anniversary. The next games night takes place at Jan’s and Pia’s home, without Matthias.