by RUPERT BOTTENBERG

Any fans of Run Lola Run out there? You'll be happy to hear that the silver-screen debut of Lola herself, the German actress Franka Potente, is unspooling at the Goethe-Institut this weekend.

Back in '95, at the age of 21, Potente took the role of smalltown high-schooler Anna in the quaint little Bavarian production Nach fünf im Urwald (English title: It's a Jungle Out There). Like other quaint little Bavarian films, Nach fünf is frustratingly neat, timid and polite. The characters are, without exception, fairly likeable, their conflicts and difficulties quite reasonable and never insurmountable, the conclusion devoid of loose ends. But that's the worst that can be said of the picture - it's obsequious.

The film is part of the Coming-of-Age series at the Goethe, and though it's ostensibly about Anna's wising up when she bolts for the, uh, "teeming metropolis" of Munich after a spat with dad (a mayoral candidate), it's really about her baby-boomer parents recalling their own irresponsible youth. As such, the movie scolds the elders for their double standards - do as we say, not as we did.

Potente shows promise in her first role, and the parents are pleasing in their befuddlement, but the most engaging character is in fact little sister Clara, who observes and documents her clan from the Olympian heights of her treehouse. As kids often do, she comes off as the most clear-headed - dare I say grown up - of the bunch.

By the way, there are further Run Lola Run connections in the Coming-of-Age series. Lammbock, a 2001 offering starring Lola's Moritz Bleibtreu, screen Feb. 12 and 13 - Lammbock being the pothead "pizzeria" that Bleibtreu's Kai and his friend open up. Yup, it's a cannabis caper, so expect the due degree of sofa-bound philosophistignation. As well, in early March the series offers Gigantic, a scenario about friends, foosball and "the night that changed all their young lives." This one's not only produced by Lola director Tom Tykwer, it's written and directed by Sebastien Schipper, one of Tykwer's actors from his international hit.

Nach fünf im Urwald is at the Goethe-Institut tonight, Thursday, Feb. 5 at 8pm and Friday, Feb. 6 at 6:30pm. The Coming-of-Age series runs until March 5

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