Julia Gorr

Tatort is a long-running German/Austrian/Swiss, crime television series set in various parts of these countries. The show is broadcast on the channels of ARD in Germany, ORF in Austria and SF1 in Switzerland.

With a woof-woof here and a baaa-baaa there and a quack-quack, oink-oink everywhere, there's always some furry or feathered creature demanding attention from the Hansens. It's partly because Dr. Philipp Hansen is a veterinarian who's just opened a practice in the big old villa he's moved into with his family. But it's mostly because of ten-year-old daughter Greta, who never saw an animal she didn't want to adopt.

Nine young actors leave behind their daily lives in Berlin and travel to the country to audition for a summer theatre production to be performed in the ruins of an old church. A once-renowned Swiss director is using this week of rehearsals to find the lead for this production of “Hamlet”. The director is staying privately at the home of an old woman, but the actors are being put up at a run-down hotel with very thin walls.

The tusk from a mammoth and a whale skeleton are found in a grotesque mix of bricks and destruction - a zoological museum has been blown up. Images of the bisected building with all the scattered remains of stuffed animals are broadcast worldwide along with the statement sent out by the underground group of artists who claim responsibility: "This is not entertainment. It is not a political statement. It is not even news... This is art!"

Berlin. Grisha, a Russian-German boy, fools around with a toygun. The longer he plays, the further he is thrust into an altered reality. The boundaries between the present and the past start to blur. Images from a bygone Berlin appear; streets and buildings still carry the memories of war. Suddenly, he is caught in a nightmare of another lifetime.

While ageing border guard Alfred tries to save his now redundant border from demolition, Cupid's arrow strikes him. For over 30 years, border guard and passionate Verdi lover Alfred Birnbaum has been guarding a border in the idyllic no man's land between Germany and the Czech Republic. His only diversion is his daily encounter with the pretty Suzanne, who crosses the border every morning on her bicycle with a heavy sack of rice. When he hears the news that Europe is now opening its borders to the Czech Republic as part of the EU's eastward expansion, rendering him superfluous, he does everything he can to save "his" border.