Thomas Benesch

Angela Merkel's decision in autumn 2015 to open the borders for refugees split the country - some praised the moral stance, others criticized the surrender of sovereignty. Yet what would appear to be well-planned activity is in reality a policy of muddling along, chance, trial and error. The Driven Ones is a chronicle of the refugee crisis which shows that the political actors are being driven along, crushed between self-imposed constraints and events that have spun out of control.

In the young Federal Republic of Germany, which in the late 1950s in politics and justice is still interspersed with only superficially purified Nazi cliques, leads the Hessian Attorney General Fritz Bauer a lonely fight against the coverup of Nazi crimes and the restorative policy of the government Adenauer - he is firmly convinced that only in this way can the young democracy be consolidated. Not only his attitude, but also his temperament make Bauer vulnerable, again and again resistance forms from politics, intelligence services and the judiciary against the lone fighter.

Heinz Gödicke (Ronals Zehrfeld) is the chief commissioner of the People's Police in the small town of Eberswalde in Brandenburg. Gödicke is called when two bestial murdered children are found in the forest. The investigator tries to get involved in the perpetrators - a rarely used method at the People's Police - and the perpetrator so on the track. The Stasi-Major Witt (Florian Panzer) is no friend of this procedure and leaves the commissioner only reluctantly free hand in the investigation. The matter does not go to the authorities fast enough and is then simply put to the files. When another murder occurs, it becomes clear that Gödicke was much closer to the enlightenment of the act than everyone thought.

Nina Hausen, head of an escort agency, is attacked by a stranger on her nocturnal walk with the dog in the forest. Only with difficulty can she escape him by touching him with her car and seriously injuring him. On the way back she finds in her car a bag of diamonds - apparently the ransom from a case in which a boy was kidnapped. Under pressure from a colleague reports Nina Although the robbery of the police, the diamonds but suppresses them. But that's where their problems really start ...

A successful investment banker, Chris, and a poor cleaner at his office, Carmen, meet after he is accused of embezzlement.

Paul and Bernd take over a small upscale antique store together. On one nightly excursion, Bernd introduces Paul and Lisa with each other. What was intended as a little variety to marriage-like everyday life develops into a great romance accompanied by a threat: If Eva hears about the affair, the financing for the shop will be in danger. Slowly but surely, Paul is ready to give up everything for Lisa: the shop, Eva and especially the loan. Bernd knows that Dragan is his only hope.