Trivia

Germany's official submission to the International Feature Film category of the 92nd Academy Awards.

Helena Zengel became the youngest actress ever in history to win the Lola for "Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role" at the German Film Awards for her performance in this film.

Nora Fingscheidt wrote the screenplay after five years of research during which she lived or worked in residential groups, in a school for educational support, an emergency accommodation centre and a child psychiatry unit. She talked to staff at institutions and agencies as well as child and youth psychologists. Fingscheidt says she made System Crasher to raise awareness of severely traumatised children like Benni.

Despite the intense scenes shown in the movie (and experiencing it as a viewer), according to interviews on the German Blu-ray disc, the actresses and actors had much fun while and after filming the scenes. Especially Helena Zengel (Benni) talked intensively about each scene with her mother, the other actresses, actors and of course also writer/director Nora Fingscheidt. This way, she saw it (and also was more than able to play it) how it really is, that this girl is very vulnerable and needs help, and not how it might seem at first, that she is a non-handle-able child which freaks out and "just destroys things" all the time. This wholesome understanding of the delicate topic made it easier for her to film these scenes, too.

The Berlin child actor Helena Zengel was chosen for the lead role. Of the 150 or so girls Fingscheidt considered, Zengel made the shortlist of ten right from the start: the filmmaker kept coming back to her. According to Fingscheidt she was the only child who could portray the aggression together with the distress: "There was never anything merely spoilt or cheeky; it was always combined with fragility and vulnerability."