Siegfried Lenz

A flash of all the everyday and poetic that happens within a second in different places in our world, based on a prose ballad by Siegfried Lenz.

In a small North German village a drama played out during and shortly after the Second World War about duty versus individual conscience and morality.

The end of a summer, a sleepy fishing port on the Baltic Sea and the beginning of a great feeling that must not be: Shortly before the start of the new school year, the 18-year-old Christian falls in love with his new English teacher Stella Petersen. In a moment of unexpected lightness and freedom, in the dunes and seascape far away from the small town, Stella and Christian discover a shared longing and an attraction to each other, the intensity of which both overwhelmed. But soon after class has begun again, the secret relationship between the young teacher and her pupil threatens the scandal ...

Set against the backdrop of post-war Germany, the screen adaptation of Siegfried Lenz’s short story released in 1949 shows a snapshot in time of Mr. Schwamm, an indulgent husband and caring father, who wants so save his depressed son. During the pivotal night of this mission, he has an odd encounter: Paired up by destiny, he confides his troubles to a bitter and insensitive stranger, who in the very last minute manages to turn the story into a touching parable for kindness and humanity.

Uli and Nora share an intimate, late love. But Uli always avoids the decision to stand on the common relationship. One morning Uli suffers a stroke during a tour of the harbor on the Elbe. He fights his way through the city to the reading room of the library where Nora works. At the last minute, an ambulance takes Uli to the hospital. In this situation, Nora is overwhelmed. When, on the initiative of her friend Eva, she fetches a few things for Uli from his apartment, a cell phone rings. At the other end there is an unknown female voice that sounds strangely familiar ...

A corpse is washed up on the beach of the North Sea. The deceased is Alexander, husband of the beautiful Bettina. They have been coming to the island for a long time and possess a cottage there. At first no one doubts that Alexander died of an accident, but the young policewoman Maike, who has known the family since her childhood, thinks that Alexander should have been familiar with the mudflat. Did he kill himself?

The naive 18 year old Dobrila leaves her little Serbian village to travel to Hamburg, Germany, where her boyfriend lives. The trip is not easy. Finally in Hamburg she has to realize her boyfriend is not very interested in a relationship. She doesn't tell him she's pregnant and starts on her way home to Serbia, which turns out to be even more exhausting.

A trio of robbers, two brothers and their twisted genius leader, invade a lightship, but don't reckon on the crew fighting back.

Three men plot to assassinate the dictator of their country, but their plan fails and one of them is captured and imprisoned. Even after considerable torture and interrogation, the revolutionary maintains his silence as to the names of his accomplices. Soon he is killed, though no one seems to know who is responsible for his death. Four years later another regime has been established, and a former inmate of the dead revolutionary finds himself in a position of power. He now intends to find out who was responsible for the man's death. After this German tale first took the form of a radio play and then a stage production, character actor Peter Carsten decided to produce this film version.