Es kommt der Tag (2009)

Alice, a journalist in her early thirties, drives to France with her boyfriend, Mo. At a motorway rest stop, she unexpectedly leaves him behind and continues on alone. That evening, Alice stages a car accident and, using a false name, asks for a room at a small vineyard with a guesthouse. The owners are not pleased by her arrival, as they had wanted to stop taking in guests. In reality, she is the daughter of Judith, the vineyard’s owner. When Alice was two years old, Judith gave her up for adoption because she had taken part in far-left crimes and gone underground. Since then, Judith has built a conventional life for herself in Alsace. She married a Frenchman and had two children, a boy and a girl, who are now teenagers. She is involved in a citizens’ campaign against genetically modified corn and was recently photographed in connection with it. Alice had come across that very photograph at the German newspaper where she worked and recognised her mother, whose face she knew from old wanted posters. Judith does not recognise her daughter until several days later, and the tensions between Alice and Judith erupt in a loud argument. Alice questions Judith’s ideals and accuses her of being a criminal. Judith’s children soon learn who their guest really is, too. Alice finds support and a taste of family life with her half-brother. But the conflict between mother and daughter is not over. Her brother accidentally discovers the wanted posters of his mother that Alice brought with her. The whole family then learns the truth about Judith’s past. To raise funds for the far-left organisation, Judith had taken part in a bank robbery and shot a man dead. Even Judith’s husband is now shaken; he had previously thought he knew everything about her past. Alice drives back to Germany with her mother, who had repaired the car earlier. Judith is thus yielding to her daughter’s wish that she turn herself in to the German police. But shortly before the border, Judith becomes so unwell that Alice stops the car. She forgives her mother and leaves her at a border bridge.