German made thriller about a killer with connections to Tattoos. When a body turns up burned and mutilated, with a chunk of skin missing, a senior cop blackmails a younger cop into helping him try and find the killer, as well as another missing girl gone two years. The investigation leads to several other bodies all with missing tattoos. Dark thriller that was explained to me as in the vein of Seven. I don't think so. It is a dark and disturbing little thriller that isn't particularly happy. Very well made and well acted the film is a bit too much form over substance at times, with its dark brooding passages and very deliberate set design. Its not bad but it kind of lessons the thrills since the film seems at times more intent on looking good. It also doesn't help that the who of the who done it is a bit too clear. Still its worth a look for those who like gritty, good looking thrillers that are a bit on the squishy side.

Though this movie does have more than passing similarities to David Fincher's SE7EN, I feel that comparing the two is unfair and, in my opinion, downright unwise. It is true that TATTOO unfolds in an ever rainy cityscape; follows the lives of two police detectives (with a vast generation and experience gap) while they chase a killer. And yes, it plays its drama out amidst a seedy German underworld

However, what transpires amidst this spectacularly visualized tapestry full of rave parties, torture chambers, skin rooms, and body modification cliques willing to sell the tattoos off their body for quick cash, is vastly different in tone and theme from Fincher's 'who done it, and why' police procedural. Here the characters are not shown as black and white, but rather in shades of gray. Their lives, their dilemmas, are the real story. Even the reasons for the killings are presented in such a way that makes you understand, if not empathize, with those that a standard Hollywood picture would casually demonize. This element of moral ambiguity, under the remarkably controlled direction of Schwentke, creates a dark, cold, and subtly stylized world, that surprisingly plays as very very real.

It is encouraging to see a European film with the refined sensibility of European cinema combined so adeptly with a genre so intrinsically American. It is also hard to believe that this is Schwentke's directorial debut. (I for one will keep my eye on him.)

It's a remarkable film, and I certainly hope it blows the doors open for other genre films shot in Germany, and in Europe as a whole. Not since viewing Spoorloos (The Vanishing) have I been so impressed. If you have a chance, don't hesitate to catch it on the big screen. It's gorgeous, it's ballsy, and it's worth it.

Lynn is a woman with a very delicate and exclusive japanese tattoo on her body. The art and class of the tattoo is so fine that a collector pays enormous amounts of money to obtain the skin art. That means ripping it of the living body in Lynn's case.

This is a German crime-movie about two cops (and not the ordinary ones) solving the mystery of the 12 missing bodies/tattoos. Who is the collector, and how can they get in touch with him?

The estethic of the movie is beautiful if you ask me. Though it is very in-your-face and raw to some people I can belive. Flames of fire and blood is the theme in contrast to stiff, clean German architecture.

I enjoyed this movie a lot and it was althrough an exiting piece of art.

/Maria