A crime rarely comes alone

crime column

A crime rarely comes alone

In today’s “crime scene” in Dresden, Gorniak, Winter and Schnabel investigate a current murder case. A trace points to an unsolved crime in GDR times.

Silvia ChuiSociety Editor

Gorniak, Winter and Schnabel investigate a murder whose origins lie far in the past. The negative first: The opening scene initially makes you want to switch off. Establishing someone as deranged by happily smearing lipstick almost under their nose couldn’t be more cliche. It is also clear almost from the first minute that this person acts as a diversionary track, called the red herring. And the fact that a kind of credits explains to us in detail what really happened, so that even the last, most screwed-up is still clear, really only says how the screenwriter Kristin Derfler assesses the intelligence of her audience: just over bread.

Important historical work, very nice camera work

So. The bitching out of the way, let’s concentrate now on why you should still see the Dresden crime scene “Totes Herz”. The cause of the murder lies in a “Children of the Landstrasse”-like practice in the GDR that needs to be dealt with and condemned. So there is a surprising twist in the investigation as to why a nursery owner was found beaten to death in her greenhouse by her son-in-law. And there’s good acting from Kristin Sukow, who plays the nursery owner’s daughter. The investigators also act solidly as usual, and for once Schnabel doesn’t have to tediously dwell on trifles. In addition, the direction by Andreas Herzog and the camera work by Marcus Kanter are really, really nice.