Seefahrt ist not! (1921)

Hamburg-Finkenwerder, in the final years of the 19th century. Klaus Mewes, whom everyone calls Störtebeker after the legendary pirate, is the son of a deep-sea fisherman. Like his father, young Störtebeker is drawn to the sea. Klaus is determined to accompany his father and sign on as his cabin boy. At last, his father gives in, and the two set sail to fish in the North Sea, leaving his worried mother behind. When they reach the next port, however, his father has second thoughts and sends the boy back to his mother. But then his father never returns home. Störtebeker waits and waits, for months. He refuses to accept that his father may be dead. Yet the experience does not deter Störtebeker, and despite his mother’s desperate pleas for him to stay ashore, he leaves home. For the boy, life at sea is a necessity: he wants to be nothing but a sailor, and eventually becomes the owner of a particularly splendid oyster cutter on the Elbe.