Also Directed by Maggie Peren
After years working as a border patrolman, José has developed a salty crust of cynicism about his work, which places him in a position to decide the fates of many. José's weary attitude is put to the test when he encounters Nathalie, a German tourist assisting a boatload of refugees she discovered landing on the Canary shores. One of those people, a Congolese man named Zola, is placed in an internment camp. Much to the objections of her husband Paul, Nathalie tries to help him escape. Yet Zola and his son Mamadou eventually find themselves in yet another precarious situation, in which they are dependent on nefarious smugglers.
The subject of male prostitution gets a distinctly zany and offbeat twist in Stellungswechsel (AKA Special Escort), Maggie Peren's tale of five male underdogs who promulgate themselves as female escorts in the city of Munich. Of that group, we meet policeman Gy, in hot water with his insurance company and enduring the vicissitudes of an on-again, off-again romance with comely Daphne; twentysomething Lasse, who lives with his mom and is pathetically henpecked by her; Giselher, a chronically unemployed former manager; Frank, a philologist who spends his days as a house husband; and Olli, a deli proprietor whose business is rapidly going under. These five conjure up the wild idea of charging for liaisons with emotionally needy women, but the scheme doesn't exactly go as planned - as none can even begin to anticipate the eccentricities or oddities of the female clients who turn up in response to their offer.