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Derrick - Angst
episode 18
West Germany 1976
produced by Claus Legal, Helmut Ringelmann (executive) for Telenova/ZDF
directed by Theodor Grädler
starring Horst Tappert, Fritz Wepper, Heidelinde Weis, Hans Dieter Zeidler, Uschi Glas, Bernd Herzsprung, Beatrice Norden, Hannes Kaetner, Jean-Pierre Zola
written by Herbert Reinecker
TV-series Derrick, Harry Klein
review by Mike Haberfelner
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Dr. Hertel (Hans Dieter Zeidler) has an affair with young Irene (Uschi
Glas), to a degree that he finances her apartment and her studies. But
then she tells him she wants to call it quits and admit he has another
lover, Jürgen (Bernd Herzsprung), though only after he finds Jürgen's
wristwatch on her nightstand. And seeing he can't sway her, he slowly
strangles her. Then he for some reason bags Jürgen's wristwatch and
leaves. Once back at the office he calls the janitor of the apartment
building Irene lives at and cheats the man into opening her apartment and
finding the corpse. When inspector Derrick (Horst Tappert) and his assistant Harry (Fritz Wepper)
arrive at the scene of the crime, Hertel shows himself to be very
cooperative and he even freely admits to having had an affair - and as an
alibi for the time of the crime he tells them he has been at home for
lunch with his wife Franziska (Heidelinde Weis) ... and back at home he
persuades Franziska, a timid person as such, to corroborate his alibi -
which she does over the phone, even if Derrick doesn't fully buy it. Then
though Jürgen shows up to fetch his watch - and of course he's totally
shattered when he learns about Irene's death, and also freely admits that
he tried to stop by at noon but nobody was home. His frankness is so
genuine that Derrick and Harry soon disregard him as a suspect. Instead
they pay an in-person visit to Franziska for her to repeat her statement,
and let the story about the missing wristwatch drop - which she soon finds
in her husband's suit. Derrick and Harry pay Hertel a couple more visits
to let him know he's not off the hook while Franziska lets him know that
she has found the wristwatch, the very thing that would tie him to the
murder, her alibi notwithstanding. Hertel though plays it cool with the
police, then coolly poisons his wife. But searching her things, he's
unable to find the wristwatch - when Derrick and Harry arrive at the scene
due to a hunch Derrick has had, only to find Franziska killed, but the
wristwatch in her hand. Ok, there's the typical stilted
dialogue as only screenwriter Herbert Reinecker could conceive it (and
that's not a compliment), and many of the characters actions and reactions
come across as rather unnatural, too. But at the same time, this is also a
nice game of cat-and-mouse and a game of alpha dog between the
killer and the police that's actually really well-structured. Plus it's
refreshing to see that for a change it's Harry, not Derrick, who asks
Franziska the decisive question about the wristwatch - as pretty much a
throwaway line, actually. So actually one of the better episodes for sure.
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