Barbara - Wild wie das Meer (1961)

The story is set on the remote Faroe Islands in the North Atlantic, which belong to Denmark. The young doctor Paul Aggersoe has taken over the island practice from his deceased predecessor. It is not long before he meets Barbara, his predecessor’s widow. She has a rather poor reputation, as people say she is quite a loose woman and was not especially faithful to her husband. Paul soon falls head over heels for the seductive young woman, and despite the islanders’ urgent warnings—they do not think much of Barbara—the two marry. But Paul soon has to realize that the people of the Faroe Islands have good reason to think little of Barbara: she simply cannot help being habitually unfaithful. Life on the island is monotonous, and the winter nights are long and dark. During one of Paul’s extended absences, his passionate wife, who cannot stay without a man for long, promptly takes up with the next man. It is Andreas, her childhood friend, whom Barbara simply cannot resist. By the time Paul returns to his home and hearth, Barbara has already moved in with her new lover. The disillusioned Aggersoe divorces her again and is transferred to Greenland. But Barbara, free-spirited and unattached by nature (and, as the TV subtitle puts it, wild as the sea), does not seem too upset: before long, she is standing on the beach, already longing for the arrival of the new island doctor.