Sanft schläft der Tod (2016)

Anja and Frank Mendt take a sailing trip on the Baltic Sea off Binz on Rügen with their two children, Leila and Finn. When the parents briefly go ashore, the boat is abducted with the children on board. When the parents report the kidnapping to the local police, Frank Mendt’s father, Herbert Winter, shows up there; he has heard about the abduction. Frank broke off contact with his father years ago because Winter was an investigator for the Stasi during the GDR era. Now Herbert Winter wants to help find the kidnapper. Shortly before the fall of the Berlin Wall, he investigated a similar kidnapping in which the perpetrator was never caught. Winter believes he is dealing with the same serial offender, now active again. Father and son follow a lead to Lübeck with Binz police officer Vogt, while experienced LKA investigator Kempin and his team pursue other leads. The police hope a televised appeal by the mother will prompt the kidnapper to take action. He calls Anja Mendt and announces that he will return the children if she earns it. She must not tell anyone about the call, or he will kill the children immediately. He unsuccessfully tries to force Anja to choose which child she loves more. At a lineup of possible suspects, she recognizes the caller’s voice but does not give him away, out of fear for her children. After Winter discovers that the kidnapper is apparently not interested in the children but in their mothers, Anja is placed under round-the-clock surveillance. In the course of their investigations, Winter and Kempin independently come across Bernd Peters, who was the victim of a serious traffic accident near Rostock and, after years in rehabilitation, has been living independently again for just under two years. As a child, his mother gave him up for adoption, while his sister was allowed to stay. When Peters leads Anja to an old, dilapidated building outside the city, the police are listening in, and Kempin follows her. He is killed, leaving Anja on her own. Peters gives her instructions over the phone and explains that she can save only one of the children. Both have been given a slow-acting, deadly poison. She can find the antidote for just one child in her car and must decide which child she wants to save. She refuses to choose, since she loves both children equally. Peters loses his composure and becomes careless, allowing Anja to overpower him at first. She then gives both children the antidote she found in his pockets. Meanwhile, Frank and his father also arrive. When Peters comes to, he and Winter die in a shootout.