Christian Zenk

Nurse Nora is looking forward to her first Christmas vacation in years and wants to spend it quietly and relaxed with her mother Ellen. She doesn't really mind that her brother Moritz, formerly Maike, isn't coming, as she has always felt inferior to him. But then not only Moritz turns up, Grandma Lore also changes her plans and, to make matters worse, they are joined by their widowed neighbor Rolf and his detestable son Bent, as well as their daughter Katja and grandson Fritz, due to a faulty heating system.

Dreamy Paula and her husband Edgar, an insurance salesman, lead a dull, middle-class life in Struvensiel, a fictitious suburb of Hamburg. Paula runs into her childhood sweetheart Max at their 10-year class reunion. In order to save him from Hamburg's underworld, she turns - to her own surprise - from a plain country bumpkin into a tough lady.