Auf dünnem Eis (2021)

It is winter in Berlin, and temperatures are below zero degrees Celsius. After her shift, cook Ira Rosenthal drives home at night and finds the underground garage in her apartment building open because of a fault in the locking system. As she tries to park, she hits a homeless man who has made a bed for the night in her parking space with his dog, “Tiger.” Ira takes the man, who has injured his foot, to the emergency room and then tries to find him a place in a shelter. But he doesn’t want to go and prefers to leave with his dog. Later, she lets Konrad, as the homeless man is called, continue sleeping in her parking space, and gives him warm clothes and food from her workplace. But Ira has enough problems of her own. She is separated from her husband, Bernhard, after he began an affair. She also struggles to balance her job with her role as a single mother to nine-year-old Lukas. Her mother, who repeatedly has to step in as a babysitter, now wants more time for herself and her ill husband, which further complicates the situation. When Ira doesn’t get the position she wanted at work, she quits and hands her boss her keys. At home, she realizes she handed over the wrong keys, and Konrad is able to help her open the door. She lets him in, gives him a bath, and washes his clothes. He is allowed to sleep on the couch, but leaves the apartment the next morning before Ira gets up. Over the following days, Ira tries to help Konrad get back on his feet. She goes with him to government offices and looks for a new place for him to stay. In the meantime, he can sleep on the couch at Ira and Lukas’s. Ira and Konrad sometimes argue, especially when it comes to the fact that his dog is not allowed to move into the new accommodation. He reveals very little about his life, but one day tells her that his son drowned several years ago. By now, Bernhard is jealous of Konrad, and once physically confronts him in the street. Bernhard ended his affair some time ago and would like to share his life with Ira again, but he is also having financial problems because a client has not paid him. Using the information she has about Konrad, Ira investigates his past. When she gets in touch with his wife, the woman asks her never to contact her again. At a later appointment at the employment office, Konrad stands Ira up. Shortly afterward, Konrad’s son turns up at Ira’s door. He has tracked her down and tells her that Konrad tells people different, untrue stories about his life. They find Konrad drunk at a subway station, where his son last saw him. Konrad is happy to see his son and badmouths Ira. Later, Ira finds Konrad unconscious outside her apartment building. She begins CPR, but the rescue efforts of the emergency medical team that arrives are unsuccessful too. In the final scene, Ira, Bernhard, and Lukas are shown playing together as a family in their apartment. They are hiding in a tent, and Ira takes Konrad’s dog inside with them.