Mensch ärgere dich nicht (1972)

Ewald Fröhlich, an executive at a milk-advertising company, has bad luck from morning till night and is accordingly always angry: he traps his fingers in the ringing alarm clock, the boiling kettle peels the kitchen wallpaper off the wall, his socks have a hole in them, his car breaks down in the middle of an intersection, and his accounts are repeatedly sent back for revision by his eternally strict boss. The only person who is kind to him is the boss’s secretary, Glöckchen, who suggests that he try smiling for a change during the day. And sure enough, people suddenly start treating him with courtesy and kindness. What Ewald doesn’t know is that he has received a letter from the lottery telling him he has won one million Deutsche Marks. His landlady knows about it because she secretly opens all of Ewald’s letters as a matter of course, and she has spread the news. However, a draft has blown the letter under a cupboard, so Ewald knows nothing about his good fortune. His car is not only repaired, but he is also given a modern loaner car for free. His landlady, who had been about to evict him just moments earlier, now does everything she can to seduce him. The landlady’s cleaning lady tries the same thing. And the neighbor, who usually only scolded Ewald, suddenly invites him over for wine. Things also start going well at work, though for a different reason. The photographer Ulla has accidentally taken a picture of Ewald gesticulating angrily, and that very photo has been enthusiastically accepted as part of a new milk-advertising campaign by Thomas, the boss’s nephew. “Don’t get upset—drink milk instead” is to be the advertising slogan. More pictures of an angry Ewald are needed, however. Ulla is to provoke these reactions, so she starts a relationship with him and repeatedly leads him into situations that make him angry. In the end, the tide turns. Ewald receives a letter from the lottery saying that the prize was the result of a misunderstanding. His landlady reads the letter first again and tells everyone else, who are now just as unfriendly as before. Ewald proposes to Ulla, but she leaves him standing without an answer, since she has long felt guilty about the advertising campaign. Finally, it is Glöckchen who clears everything up. Shortly after Ewald finds the lottery letter under the cupboard, she finds the letter denying the lottery win and destroys his hopes of great wealth. At the same time, at Ulla’s request, she explains the true circumstances behind Ulla’s interest in him and shows him the advertising-campaign photos. Ewald, in turn, realizes that he can’t be angry with Glöckchen over what she has revealed, and proposes to her instead. Glöckchen accepts.