In the film “Until the Last Drop” with Sebastian Bezzel and Ulrich Tukur, water becomes an object of speculation. The documentary shows the true core.
On Wednesday evening (March 16), the first shows the feature film “Until the last drop” (8:15 p.m.). At the end it says: “The plot, people and companies in this film are fictitious. Unfortunately, everything else is not.” Viewers will find out what “everything else” means in the documentary, which will be shown after the feature film has been broadcast.
That’s what the TV movie “Until the last drop” is about
Martin Sommer (Sebastian Bezzel), Mayor of Lauterbronn, has problems. The small town in southern Germany’s Tauber Valley is idyllic, but structurally weak and heavily dependent on agriculture. As more businesses are lost, Ava Sommer (Hannah Schiller), the single father of a teenage daughter, worries about the future of the town and local finances.
The silver lining is the offer of an international beverage manufacturer. Because Lauterbronn has a resource that can be used commercially: extensive groundwater deposits of very good quality. The company PureAqua in the form of their German representative Dr. Rainer Gebhard (Ulrich Tukur) makes a lucrative offer for extraction rights, secures jobs and is supported by state politics, for which Julia Roland (Karoline Schuch), water officer at the Ministry of the Environment, is on duty.
With a report that certifies Lauterbronn’s virtually inexhaustible deep water reserves, possible objections are calmed, including those of Mayor Sommer. He supports the deal and releases land for a test well. Nevertheless, resistance forms, which becomes more and more violent. Ava vehemently opposes her father’s plans and becomes the front figure of a citizens’ initiative.
The protest against the sell-off of water rights is vocal and combative. He is particularly bitter with the farmer Bernhard Schultz (Michael Roll), who could not prevent the well from being drilled on the land he leased. His farm is already suffering from the increasing drought, and the privatization of groundwater resources is a scandal for him, which he uses drastic means to draw attention to.
Martin Sommer did not expect so much headwind. He also feels let down by politics. And so he considers backtracking. But is that still possible?
Sebastian Bezzel, Ulrich Tukur and Karoline Schuch in the cast
The filmmakers were able to win over a number of German acting stars for “Until the last drop”. One of them is Ulrich Tukur (64). Born in Hesse and now a Berliner by choice, who has pretty much every renowned acting award at home, he has been responsible for particularly bizarre cases as “Tatort” commissioner Felix Murot since 2010.
In “To the Last Drop” he plays an unscrupulous manager of a large US corporation who is only out for profit. “Human greed and stupidity are ineradicable, and it’s difficult to counteract the power of money and corrupt politicians,” says Tukur. But it is not impossible. And he continues: “Courage and civic responsibility sometimes move things in the right direction, even if they already seem lost.”
The Bavarian actor and Hamburger Sebastian Bezzel (50) can be seen in the film as the village mayor. Some know him as the former Konstanz “Tatort” commissioner Kai Perlmann (2004-2016), others adore him as the title character of the Eberhofer cult crime series (since 2013).
About the dilemma that his role in the film is in, he says: “It was precisely because of such questions and decisions that I never applied for political offices such as that of mayor and probably never will,” says Bezzel. He understands Martin Sommer very well insofar as he tries very hard to give the region and the people future prospects. “However, the sale of water to a large corporation is a human rights violation and Martin’s actions, despite his good intentions, are an absolute taboo for me personally,” says the actor. And he becomes even clearer: “Water is there for everyone and must not be or become an object of speculation.”
Karoline Schuch (40) should also not be unknown to the television and cinema audience. She played the title roles in films worth seeing such as “Hanna’s Journey” (2014) or “Katharina Luther” (2017) and was also part of Bully’s (53) extremely successful thriller debut “Ballon” (2018).
In “Up to the Last Drop” she doesn’t cover herself with fame as a representative of politics. Before working on this film, the actress, who was born in Jena, knew “almost nothing” about the sales of water rights in Germany. Today she too has a clear opinion on this: “I find the unsustainable transfer of water rights to large international corporations highly questionable and particularly negligent and wrong in the real, threatening times of climate change,” says Schuch. Water is a human right and “the most important resource on our planet”.
Embedded in the ARD main topic “Our Water”
The film is embedded in the ARD special topic “Our Water”. Among other things, the documentary “Until the last drop – the documentary” will be shown after the feature film from 9:45 p.m. Responsible for this is none other than the award-winning author, director and producer Daniel Harrich (38). His films such as “The Blind Spot – The Oktoberfest Attack” (2013) or “Master of Death – Deadly Exports” (2015) not only won awards, they also brought movement to the discussion of the relevant topics.
In “Up to the Last Drop – The Documentary” Harrich shows the reality behind the fictional film story: For years, an international beverage company has been trying to develop a large groundwater reservoir for its bottling plant near Lüneburg, Lower Saxony. There have long been doubts about the group’s report on the safety of the water withdrawal. A local citizens’ initiative wants to stop the approval process.
According to the broadcaster, the group announced during the filming that it wanted to stop the project “for the time being”. The citizens’ initiative does not believe that. How the dispute over the water near Lüneburg ends may therefore remain open …