The bonds of familial trust are stretched to their breaking point in The Good Sister (2025), an exceptional debut by Sara Miro Fischer with an equally nuanced, here-I-am performance by relative newcomer Marie Bloching. A heavy drama about bearing witness to horror and the moral quagmire of truly loving your sibling, its difficult subject matter is matched by its quiet confidence in execution.
Bloching plays Rose Berger as an aimless yet likeable young soul, one of many Berliners — matter-of-fact, queer, artsy — drifting from one relationship to the other and one apartment to the next. After breaking up with her ex-girlfriend for reasons unknown, she moves in with her brother Sami (Anton Weil), where he generously gives her the couch. Similar in age, they are remarkably close and intimate; they swim in the lake together, she cuts his hair and he doesn’t hesitate to let her stay as long as she needs in the wake of her toxic break-up.
This is why she cannot believe her ears when, half-asleep, she hears her brother come home with a young woman, followed by the sounds of grunting and smashed furniture. This uncomfortable moment is the first of many fantastic scenes that play with perspective and put us into Rose’s headspace. Is it simply sex gone wrong? Or is it something more sinister?
This question is put to the test when Sami is later accused of rape. She tries not to think about it. But like the tap in Sami’s apartment that seems to leak no matter what she tries, it’s clear that this is an event that cannot be simply ignored in the hope it finally disappears. Sooner or later, the water is going to flow.
Good Sister is a brilliant exercise in moral relativity, taking what appears to be a clear-cut case before applying the infinite complications of real-life relationships. It all rests upon the performance of Bloching, who adds nuance with every gesture, portraying silliness and seriousness, childlike denial and sober realisation with ease. It shows that witnessing a trauma can cause its own form of PTSD, and how doing the right thing can take everything you have.
The key moment I realised this was a seriously good movie came during a three-scene combination that proceeds with the logic of a terrifying nightmare. From the shock realisation to a surprise party (with a seemingly random Metronome needle drop in the middle) Fischer sweeps us up in the story, creating a genuine sense of moral confusion paired with forward narrative momentum.
At a time when more and more moral dramas love to spell out the dilemma over and over again, it’s deeply refreshing to see a film that has the ability to challenge our expectations and defy stereotypes by simply putting one good scene in front of the other. To be honest, the filmmaking isn’t particularly flashy. It’s in getting the simple choices right— when to pan, when to cut, who to focus on when and where — that Good Sister thrives. Using the power of omission and letting the viewer form their own connections between scenes and characters, Fischer’s debut becomes a forbidding work of dramaturgy that’s deeply hard to shake.
One could say that the ending feels obvious, but I think that’s the entire point. Everything here moves with the inevitability of classical tragedy.
Redmond is the editor-in-chief of Journey Into Cinema.