Ein starkes Team: Abgetaucht (2020) - Sympathetic characters but strange story with plot holes - 5/10 (05/01/20)

Abgetaucht is the eightiest film of the German Ein starkes Team crime film series.

The story revolves around a lawyer who is killed in a sauna. The main suspect is a childhood friend of one of the investigators who has to go into hiding. However, the suspect himself is being hunted down by foreigners tied to organized crime in the construction business.

The movie convinces with its charismatic locations showing the clean and dirty sides of German capital Berlin. The characters are dynamic, intriguing and sympathetic. The film remains tense until its final moments.

This episode however includes several plot holes. An elderly lady asks the fugitive to buy some groceries for her without even giving him a list or telling him what to buy. The obnoxious female investigator lies to her partners and manipulates the investigations in a way that she would normally at least get suspended or perhaps even fired in real life. In the showdown, two captives are unable to open a window that is though perfectly easy to open. I sure know this for a fact because the basement of my parents' house has the exact same windows as in the movie.

Despite numerous headscratching plot holes, Abgetaucht is an overall entertaining thriller for genre fans.