Weihnachten... ohne mich, mein Schatz! (2012)

Sixty-year-old architect Ruprecht “Rupi” Welser and his wife Johanna return from a holiday in Dubai to pre-Christmas Hamburg. Rupi is annoyed by the delay because a city construction contract is due to be awarded that evening, and he has submitted a proposal based on his dream project. Without checking that Johanna has even got into the taxi, he tells the driver to leave, then brusquely tells Johanna over the phone to take another taxi. The young driver, Ellie, is astonished when Johanna tells her she has no money with her because her husband left her behind at the airport. When they arrive at the couple’s villa, Rupi immediately directs Johanna back into Ellie’s waiting taxi so she can get to the contract award. Instead of apologizing to Johanna for treating her disrespectfully, he reproaches her as well. Disgusted, Johanna stays in the taxi when they reach their destination and tells Ellie to keep driving. The two women become friends. While Rupi wins the construction contract, Johanna spends the evening with Ellie. They go to a wrestling event, where Johanna realizes how angry she is with her husband. Rupi, unable to reach her on her mobile phone at home, promptly has her bank card blocked, but soon regrets it. Since Johanna can no longer stay at a hotel as a result, Ellie invites her in. Johanna meets Ellie’s children, Jenny and Richy, as well as her partner, long-haul truck driver Marcel, who has just returned from a trip. Johanna is about to leave when two construction workers arrive and tell Ellie that her apartment building is to be demolished the next day. In fact, the chaotic Ellie received the relevant notices some time ago, but only ever skimmed them and mostly ignored them. Johanna manages to bluff the demolition crew into leaving. At that point, Johanna does not yet realize that the demolition is part of the development project Rupi has won. When Mrs. Heyer gives the two women the cold shoulder, Johanna tells her that the leases held by Ellie and her neighbor, Mrs. Basinski, who has spent her entire life in the building, cannot be terminated because of how long they have lived there, and that demolishing the building is therefore illegal. Johanna and Ellie organize a protest and draw the media’s attention to the issue. A former fellow student of Johanna’s, now a specialist lawyer in tenancy law, obtains an injunction against the demolition. Rupi, who learned at the protest that his own wife is fighting to save the building, is pressured by his client, Mrs. Heyer, to push through the demolition by any means necessary. Meanwhile, Rupi continues trying, in growing frustration, to reach Johanna, but she does not answer her phone. Their son Leo, who has come to spend Christmas with his parents and his young son, is also becoming increasingly desperate at the prospect of having to take care of everything himself. Since Johanna is not there as usual to help, Rupert asks his assistant Marion to pick up his father, Friedrich, for the festivities. When Marion sees the chaos in the household, she stays for a few hours at Leo’s request and takes care of the kitchen. “Grandpa Friedrich” once saved 17 people’s lives as a firefighter during the 1962 storm surge. In a brief conversation, Johanna tells Rupi that, given the situation, he has to choose between his construction project and his marriage. Mrs. Heyer first has the tenants’ heating turned off, then arranges a forced auction of the building for December 27, intending to buy it herself. This maneuver voids the existing leases. When Mrs. Heyer summons him, Rupi realizes that, under the guise of socially responsible urban renewal, she is ruthlessly pursuing her own ambitious goals, and he tells her he is no longer willing to work with her. As he leaves the villa, he runs into Johanna and Ellie and helps them steal the Christmas tree from the villa’s terrace. Because Johanna refuses to come home, Leo goes to Ellie’s with his young son, Marion, and Grandpa Friedrich so they can celebrate Christmas together. There, Johanna and Rupert finally find the words to talk through their situation for the first time. When they then have to deliver the bad news to everyone gathered that a forced auction is planned, Mrs. Basinski sneaks away to end her life. Grandpa Friedrich saves her. Johanna then realizes that he has saved her for the second time: she was one of the 17 people he rescued during the 1962 storm surge. Another of them was the city’s current mayor. This gives Johanna an idea that could save the building. When Mrs. Heyer arrives on December 27 with an eviction order for the building, Johanna is able to show her, in the mayor’s presence, a certificate placing the building under heritage protection with immediate effect, thereby preventing its demolition. Rebuked by the mayor for her antisocial conduct, Mrs. Heyer has the police she arranged to clear the building leave, then drives away. At the belated Christmas celebration, Johanna and Rupi reconcile, Marion and Leo become a couple, Marcel unexpectedly returns to Ellie and the children, and Mrs. Basinski and Grandpa Friedrich grow closer as well.