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Derrick - Kein schöner Sonntag
episode 22
West Germany 1976
produced by Claus Legal, Gustl Gotzler (executive), Helmut Ringelmann (executive) for Telenova/ZDF
directed by Leopold Lindtberg
starring Horst Tappert, Fritz Wepper, Ullrich Haupt, Gudrun Thielemann, Andreas Seyferth, Claudia Golling, Henning Schlüter, Johanna Hofer, Herbert Weissbach, Renate Grosser, Petra Peters
written by Herbert Reinecker, music by Rolf A. Wilhelm
TV-series Derrick, Harry Klein
review by Mike Haberfelner
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Schirmer (Ulrich Haupt) has embezzled money from the company he works
at for years, but at first he was clever about it and never
"borrowed" more than he knew he could pay back within reason.
Only lately, he let all caution go and got into big but as yet unnoticed
debt. His son Jürgen (Andreas Seyferth) gets wind about it, and between
the two of them they come up with a plan for Jürgen to break into
Schirmer's office to clear out the safe, that way obscuring the sum
Schirmer has taken out, a plan that involves them going to the theatre
with Schirmer's wife (Gudrun Thielemann) and daughter (Claudia Golling) as
an alibi, with Jürgen slipping out through the performance to break into
the office and do the deed. Thing is, Jürgen's surprised by the night
watchman (Herbert Weissbach), and when Jürgen tries to make a getaway, he
pushes the other down some stairs, injuring him gravely in the process.
Fortunately, the night watchman holds on to his life, but the guilt almost
breaks Jürgen. The next day, inspector Derrick (Horst Tappert) and his assistant Harry Klein
(Fritz Wepper), and naturally they question Schirmer as it was his office
that was broken into, and circumstantial evidence suggests it was an
inside job. Schirmer of course has an alibi - that sounds just a little
too perfect for Derrick, so he decides to dig deeper here, and when he and
Harry meet Jürgen, who wears his guilt pretty much on his sleeve, they
know something's deeply wrong and thus put the virtual thumbscrews on
Schirmer - who remains rock solid in his statements though. But when news
comes in that the night watchman has died from his injuries, Jürgen
breaks and gives himself up ... What's interesting about this
entry is that it spends a lot of time with its culprits before even
bringing in its lead investigators (which is only about halfway through
the episode), to give them plenty of emotional background and give the
audience a somewhat nuanced picture of the piece's "baddies".
All of this is of course thrown out of the window as soon as Derrick and
Harry enter the scene and things seemingly have to folloow the series'
formula, which apparently involves the culprit giving himself away, and
rather blatantly so even. So basically you see writer Herbert Reinecker
trying to break the mold he has made up himself for his cop shows, then
losing faith and putting everything back into place again, via his old
routine of stilted dialogues and unnatural character actions and
reactions. So basically a promising episode that just refuses to keep its
promise. Still fun to watch through a nostalgic lense, but nothing beyond
just that.
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