Meine Mutter spielt verrückt (2019)

Country inn owner Antonia “Toni” Janssen and Michelin-starred chef Rufus van Berg have been running Toni’s “Kupferkanne” together for a year, combining fine dining with home-style cooking. Their initial excitement about working together gradually gives way to the daily grind. Toni feels increasingly pushed out of the kitchen by Rufus, so she focuses on the service instead, leaving Toni’s mother, Heidi, feeling useless. Fortune smiles on them when Heidi unexpectedly wins a prize draw for a wellness weekend for two at the Ocean Grand Hotel. Since Rufus feels he can’t leave the restaurant, Toni and Heidi take the weekend away together. Shortly after arriving in the far north, Heidi runs into Ivo, a former employee of Rufus’s who now works at the hotel as a waiter. Toni’s mother is immediately “smitten” with the attractive Belgian and spends nearly every spare moment with him from then on. Ivo tells Heidi about his dream of opening a restaurant of his own, and after just a few conversations, Heidi is willing to provide him with financial support. Toni is not at all pleased with this plan; after all, they hardly know Ivo. At first, he is reluctant to accept the money Heidi has managed to get hold of so quickly, but in the end he takes it. Back at the “Kupferkanne,” Rufus is having problems with his supplier in France. After some thought, he decides to use regional producers instead. Toni has been telling him for some time that he shouldn’t always buy expensive, high-end ingredients from abroad. But that’s not all: the stove now “gives up the ghost,” putting the evening service in jeopardy. Fortunately, Toni’s former boyfriend Hans-Jürgen is able to help and repair it. Without consulting Toni, Rufus hires HaJü as the caretaker. When Toni calls Rufus and tells him that her mother is about to make a huge mistake, but won’t listen to anything she says, Rufus immediately sets off after the two women to support Toni. His team runs the restaurant on its own in the meantime. Rufus now has to explain to Heidi that Ivo has a very casual attitude toward money and that she has probably made a big mistake. Heidi realizes this for herself when she catches Ivo at the casino, where he has just gambled away all the money. Heidi is devastated and deeply disappointed in Ivo. Toni insists that Ivo sign an acknowledgment of debt for her mother, but he admits that these are not his only debts. Toni then tries her own luck at the casino and actually manages to make up almost a third of her mother’s loss. Ivo promises Heidi that he will do everything he can to pay her back. Back in the Eifel, Rufus proposes to Toni, and Heidi gets a glimmer of hope too: she receives a letter from Ivo saying that he will soon bring her the first 1,000 euros in person.