Hannas Entscheidung (2012)

In the small Bavarian town of Neumarkt, Hanna Forster spends years after the end of World War II waiting for her husband, Karl, to return from Soviet captivity. While he is away, she keeps his carpentry business running on her own, ensuring a livelihood for herself, their two children, and her mother-in-law. She enjoys the work, and the customers are satisfied, but Hanna lacks the master craftsman's certificate required to run and continue the workshop under the new political conditions. She also faces competition from Adi Zollner, who, though only moderately skilled as a carpenter, is favored for public contracts because he is related to the mayor. When Karl finally returns after seven years in captivity, he immediately takes over the business again. However, the paralysis of his left arm limits his ability to work, and his pride prevents him from accepting his wife's help. Hanna finds it difficult to confine herself once more to the role of housewife and mother, and the couple repeatedly quarrels; Karl does not even refrain from getting physical. Traumatized by the war and captivity, he feels a vague anger inside him that he can barely control. At night, he is regularly plagued by nightmares, for which Hanna gives him Pervitin. He has also lost his sexual potency. When the carpentry business runs into financial difficulties, Adi Zollner offers to take over Karl's company, but Karl refuses. Meanwhile, without her husband's knowledge but using his forged signature, Hanna applies to a vocational school for carpentry training, but fails the entrance exam because of her nervousness. When Karl finds out, he is so furious that he beats his wife. Hanna now sees no future in staying together and resolves to leave him. As he tries to manage the work in the workshop alone, Karl takes increasingly large amounts of Pervitin until he eventually collapses and has to be hospitalized. To save the business, Hanna sells it to Adi Zollner while Karl is in the hospital, once again forging Karl's signature. When Karl returns and realizes what has happened, they get into a furious scuffle, during which a shelf holding containers of turpentine oil topples over and sets the workshop on fire. Hanna now decides once and for all to leave her husband. Karl agrees on the condition that she never comes back. Hanna is allowed to take their daughter, Vera, while their son, Michael, is to stay with his father and learn the carpentry trade. As a parting gift, Karl sends his wife his master craftsman's book, along with the address of a timber merchant looking for a warehouse manager. Hanna and her daughter drive away. It remains unclear whether she achieves her dream.