Ilse is the woman who never fit in. This is the exact opposite of her hardworking sister Katharina, who brought up her brother, as well as her son and grandson, and who always put her own life and needs to one side and gave up everything for the family. Didn't Katharina deserve finally, in December 1990, to get her reward. Despite the lie, which she has been living, and which she only now admits to her family? Finally, on the occasion of her 70th birthday she comes together with her childhood sweetheart Alf, who only ever wanted her sister Ilse. In a similar way Germany is now also reunited. Forty years ago she fled from her native Dresden to Hamburg. Now she wants to return. Katharine feels no sense of injustice, as she calls for the return of "her" house on the river Elbe. Was it ever really hers? After all she bought it for a "song" from a Jewish family in Nazi-ruled Germany.
—Ulla Stöckl