Gaming Instinct

Gaming Instinct

What if life were a game? The brainy but abrasive 15-year-old high school outsider Ada likes this idea. When she meets Alev, the school's new alpha male, she is she is riveted by him. They start a game nobody can win.

With wide-open eyes and unstoppable momentum, the characters of GAMING INSTINCT run head-first into a tangled drama of cruelty and manipulation, attraction and love. Acclaimed German filmmaker Gregor Schnitzler ("The Cloud") stages a fiendish game of power, obsession and intrigue - with star-making turns by Michelle Barthel (FIPA D'OR, "Best International Actress" for her role in "No Fear") and Jannik Schümann ("Barbara"). Based on Juli Zeh's award-winning novel (Prix de Cévennes 2008), which has been published in over ten countries, including France and Spain.

"An atmospheric thriller about the coming-of-age of two brilliant loners, whose intelligence and ruthlessness endangers first everyone around them and then themselves." (Zeit)

What if life were a game? And terrible things could be excused by declaring them "just for fun?" Ada likes this idea. The brainy but abrasive 15-year-old high school outsider meets life's annoyances with sass and spunk. But when she meets Alev, the school's new alpha male, her life takes a completely new turn. Though Alev immediately attracts a host of followers, Ada is his soulmate. With her, he can achieve what he wants: Namely, mess with Smutek, the Polish-born German teacher and track & field coach. Alev convinces Ada to seduce the unhappily married man. Capturing everything on video, Alev then blackmails him. The weekly seduction ritual takes an unexpected turn when Smutek and Ada begin to develop real feelings for one another. Life may be just a game, but the players have gone too far, and know that there can be no winner ?