Dora Heldt: Wind aus West mit starken Böen (2016)

Katharina Johanson works as a researcher in Hamburg. Her relationship with her boyfriend, Jens, is somehow off-kilter and not at all suited to her perfectionist nature. Her younger sister, Inken, is her complete opposite. She still lives on Sylt and is a full-blown chaos merchant. She has debts, but she doesn’t seem to care. She keeps unpaid bills and reminders in a drawer. When bestselling author Bastian de Jong contacts Katharina’s agency to request research for his next novel, which is set on Sylt, Katharina’s boss wants her to take on the assignment. At first she refuses, because she never wants to return to Sylt in her life. But Jens’s behavior makes her reconsider. So she accepts the job. When Inken learns that Katharina is coming, she panics and starts tidying up the chaos at home. She doesn’t want her perfect sister to see how she lives. Soon after arriving, Katharina learns about her sister’s financial problems. Author de Jong turns up on Sylt himself a short time later, and his strange behavior leaves her puzzled. At the hotel reception, Katharina then runs into Hennes, her great love from the past. In a panic, she claims she’s just about to check out of the hotel. De Jong hears the story and tries to persuade her to stay. But Katharina packs her things and moves in with her sister. While doing her research, she meets Martha Jendrysciak at the village museum. Nicknamed “Doctor Martha,” she was Katharina’s teacher in the past. Katharina tells her she is looking for information about some paintings that the artist—whose book de Jong wants to write—once painted of his muse. Hennes visits Inken and tries to use her to get back in touch with Katharina, but Inken gives him the brush-off. De Jong is unhappy with Katharina because she has no results to show yet. Katharina then argues with Inken, partly because she is still such a chaos merchant. When Katharina runs into Hennes, he gets an earful too, as she blames him for everything. Hennes meets Doctor Martha and talks with her about the old days. She encourages him not to give up. Katharina happens to find her sister’s bills and berates her over them. Inken is desperate because she feels she could never measure up to her perfect sister anyway. Doctor Martha invites Katharina to dinner but doesn’t tell her that she has also invited Hennes. The evening turns into a merry, alcohol-fueled affair, and since neither Katharina nor Hennes is fit to drive, they spend the night in the guest room and sleep together. The next morning, she leaves before Hennes wakes up. When they speak on the phone afterward, she tells him that all she wants is for them to remain good friends. After that, she goes with de Jong to a pub to follow up a lead. Martha and Hennes show up too, and the four of them have a picnic in the dunes. Katharina talks things through with Hennes, then leaves the island completely confused, as she is beginning to doubt whether she really is so perfect. Back in Hamburg, she confesses to Jens that she cheated on him, and they break up. While studying a photograph she took in the dunes, she realizes in astonishment that Doctor Martha must have been the painter’s muse. She returns to Sylt to tell de Jong the news. Afterward, she helps her sister with her financial problems. When she goes looking for Hennes, he has just left the hotel, but he has left her a letter. While she is still reading it, he appears behind her, because he absolutely had to know whether Katharina could still learn. De Jong, who is in the early stages of Alzheimer’s disease, has stayed with Doctor Martha, and Katharina with Hennes. Katharina has also helped de Jong complete his book, “Lifeline—The Painter’s Muse.”