Die Liebe kommt selten allein (2006)

Sabine Köster makes her husband and two daughters promise that surely they can put up with her widowed sister, Eva Beckstedt, visiting once a year. Her attempt to emphasize Eva’s positive qualities fails miserably, however. Eva has barely arrived before she is firing off some pretty nasty remarks in every direction. The Köster family breathes a sigh of relief when the birthday visit is over for another year. On her way back, Eva is stopped in the stairwell by Mrs. Metz, who asks her to give her 16-year-old son Dennis a job in her workshop. Eva flatly refuses. While bowling with friends, Eva again can’t stop herself from making insulting remarks, and always ends by insisting that surely people are still allowed to speak their minds. When she gets home that evening, she is in for an unpleasant surprise: her picture-framing shop has been broken into, as has Mrs. Metz’s shop, and Mrs. Metz has been seriously injured. The break-in, which left Eva’s shop completely wrecked, brings her into contact with two men who could hardly be more different: the courteous detective Ferdinand Rixen, who seems to like Eva, and Harry Stockert, a down-to-earth, unconventional master painter and decorator. The property management company has sent him to renovate Eva’s shop. Although Eva initially makes fun of him, he manages to get through to the rational art connoisseur, especially after he helps her out of a dangerous situation. When Eva receives an invitation from Ferdinand Rixen, she finds it hard to admit to herself that she is pleased. At dinner, she says that nobody needs to worry about her. Rixen replies that perhaps someone might want to, and, when she asks what he means, explains that he believes there is a lovable core beneath her rough exterior. The evening brings another surprise. Dennis has run away from the youth home where he was placed until his mother can take care of him again. He asks Eva for support, but she refuses, whereupon he tells her in no uncertain terms what he thinks of her. Deep in thought, and also influenced by a conversation with Harry Stockert, who tells her that he was once in a youth home too, Eva changes her mind and agrees to look after Dennis while his mother is in the hospital. It does not go without setbacks, but it brings both Eva and Dennis closer together, and gradually changes them. When Mrs. Metz is discharged from the hospital, Eva realizes how much the responsibility and time spent with Dennis have meant to her. The boy makes it clear, however, that they will stay in touch. It is Sabine’s birthday again, and this time a completely different Eva shows up. She is accompanied by Harry Stockert, Ferdinand Rixen, and Dennis, and even the greeting is entirely unlike those of previous years. The party, too, is cheerful and lively. Eva has changed; she finds life “wonderful, simply wonderful.”