The Lost Brother

A small town in the province of Westphalia, summer of 1960: Max does not like the idea that his older brother Arnold presumed dead could still be alive. His parents had to leave behind Arnold, their first-born son, when fleeing from the East in the last winter of the war. Although father Blaschke does everything to make his grocery store a success and the family can venture a new beginning without any financial worries, mother Elisabeth cannot get over the loss of her son. “He’s there all the time,” says Max, blaming the unknown brother for his parents’ attitude of hardly noticing him. The situation comes to a head, when they receive a letter from the German Red Cross. It states that the now 15-year-old “foundling 2307” living in an orphanage may be Arnold. From now on, Elisabeth does not leave any stone unturned to get back her supposed son. Even when the “hereditary biological opinion” is ambiguous, which prevents her from establishing contact with her son, she does not give up.