Kleo (2022) – ROCKING GOOD!

It’s 1987, and the Cold War is in full swing. Kleo Straub, an unofficial “wet work” specialist – meaning assassin – is infiltrated through The Wall into West Berlin to assassinate a target. She reaches the nightclub and entices the target, but not before an off-duty West Berlin cop Sven Petzold (Dimitri Schaad), tries to pick her up. She kills the target and calmly walks to her designated point, from where she moves back to East Berlin to be picked up by her controller and lover, Andi Wolf (Vladimir Burkalov). They go to her apartment, and she informs Andi that she is pregnant with his child. He is happy and promises to marry her. On her way to work the next day, she is picked up and tried for espionage – for selling state secrets. In prison, she loses her child after being beaten by fellow inmates.

Two years pass. The Wall comes down in 1989. In 1990 all political prisoners are released in a general amnesty. She goes to her old apartment to see it occupied by a drug-addicted DJ, Thilo (Julius Feldmeir). She goes back to her grandfather, whom she has admired and discovers that he was the one who had ordered the arrest. Soon the killings start as she wants to find out the secret for which she had been sent to jail and for which everyone is prepared to kill her.

At the same time, Sven has got Kleo’s Stasi file and is also chasing her while being obstructed by his superiors. Soon they are forced to team up and work together

From the word go, Kleo moves at a blistering pace. In fact, the initial four episodes remind you of the 1967 Lee Marvin starrer Point Blank (1967), in which Marvin only wants his share of the loot from a robbery in which he was framed and sent to prison. So he comes back and asks ONLY for his share of the money while blowing away anyone who stands in his path. (The movie was remade in  1999 as Payback with Mel Gibson). In the same way, all Kleo wants to know is who sent her to prison and for what reason. Her single-minded quest is all that matters, and she is least bothered about the moral angle. After all, the people who sent her to prison hardly had any morals in the first place.

The series has an almost comic-book feel though it’s pretty violent, with Kleo doing the lion’s share of the killing. Yet Kleo is an innocent as she discovers that the man she killed in 1987 was part of a larger conspiracy, and this is what she wants to unravel.

The mix of characters is impressive. Take your pick. Moles in the BND, in the Stasi. A Chinese origin female BND officer who quotes Sun Tzu. The German police. The former Stasis. Her former lover, now married and whose pregnant wife is in her final month of pregnancy. Real-life hard-boiled Stasis like Erich Mielke, killed in this series by Kleo (!!) – but died peacefully in 2000. The atmosphere of change in Germany. The Trabants and Wartburgs . The consumer craze for jeans. Thilo and his wacky “I am from Sirius Six visiting Earth” mantra to justify his drug deals.

All these and more make this an excellent cracking good thriller that never lets down on the pace. Jella Haase’s gamin-like face is used to advantage as it hides the viciousness of the Stasi killer. Yet, she is also a bit of an “innocent” as she only knows that the play has a bigger plot. She is neatly complemented by Dimitri Schaad as the fumbling, bumbling Sven, who is at loggerheads with his police boss and is sure that cracking the 1987 murder and catching Kleo would be his passport to working in the homicide division.

This is a cracking good eight-part serial that never lets up in its pacing. Though the last two episodes are a bit “filmy” – with coincidences galore – it is still worth watching. I binge watched it over two days – its THAT good !

The series is available on Netflix.

Script – 4 out of 5

Story – 4 out of 5

Direction – 4 out of 5

Photography – 4 out of 5

Overall: 4 out of 5