An island paradise gets into trouble

After all, it is the first North German series production to be supported by the new series funding programme introduced last year by Filmförderung Hamburg Schleswig-Holstein. Script Writer and Director Friedemann Fromm had a high-calibre German-Danish cast at his disposal, with Jan Josef Liefers and Katharina Schüttler in the leading roles of the two pairs of parents and Lene Maria Christensen and Thure Lindhardt. "Tod von Freunden" tells the story of four inseparable friends who live together on a picturesque island in the Flensburg Fjord in the German-Danish border region. Together with their children, they live a paradisiacal dream of an extended family on the island. The children have grown up like siblings and enjoy all the freedom they can get. But then an accident happens on the last sailing trip of the year on the "Orplid", the friends' shared ship; at night in rough seas, the teenager Kjell goes overboard and is not found despite an intensive search. His parents Sabine and Bernd were not on board and now want to know how it could have happened. Questions about guilt and failure arise, as well as about truth and trust. The tragedy causes the first cracks to appear in the intact family façade and secrets and life lies gnaw at the foundations. Script Writer and Director Friedemann Fromm asks how we deal with the truth and how vulnerable a seemingly happy family world is when it is built on lies and secrets.

The theme is the family as a living social organism, but also a fragile one when it comes under pressure. The Küster and Jensen families have virtually created a paradise for themselves. But through misfortune, the shadows of the past catch up with this world and call their life plan into question. "Essentially, I was interested in the question of how much we know about the people around us and what impact this has on friendships and relationships," explains Fromm. In the series, it is primarily Bernd, the father of the lost teenager, who is determined to find out the truth. "But you also have to be able to bear this truth. Is there a limit where truth becomes toxic?" asks Fromm.

The main motif of the family paradise is located on the Danish Ochseninsel in the Flensburg Fjord. However, the filming of this location was cancelled because the buildings there, two residential buildings and two boat sheds, were to be demolished in order to completely renaturalise the island, which happened shortly after filming was completed. There used to be an old boatyard there. After being decommissioned, the buildings were used as a home by a group of dropouts who tried to realise an alternative life project on the island, and were ultimately no longer inhabited for several years, reports the local Directors, who wrote the series with this exact location in mind. The Danish authorities cooperated with the production and waited for the filming, which, however, had to be realised under some time pressure in summer 2019. The first task was to transport all the logistics and equipment to the island and set up the film set there. The team and actors travelled back and forth between the mainland and the film location via a dedicated ferry service.

In November 2019, the dramatic scenes on the boat were moved to Greece for a week due to the water and air temperatures there. It would definitely have been too cold in the Baltic Sea. "We preferred the boat to the studio with a pool of water in order to stay true to the style of our series, to be as close to the characters as possible and to film a lot with a moving handheld camera." And when the boy Kjell (Lukas Zumbrock) goes overboard, the Director of Photography also had to get into the water to swim along with a small, handy Blackmagic Pocket Cinema camera in a protected water housing. The actors were protected by an escort boat with a safety crew. The film was shot 'day for night', which means that the images taken during the day had to be recoloured into night scenes afterwards at Hamburg's Studio Post Republic.

The Directors, himself a passionate sailor, also has experience. In 2016, he also realised some scenes on a sailing boat for the TV thriller "Murderous Silence" and travelled far out into the bay of the Jade Bay off Wilhelmshaven with a small crew and actors. Incidentally, Jan Josef Liefers was also the main actor in this shoot and had to jump into the cold North Sea up to eight times. At the time, the water temperature in October was 9 degrees!

Tod von Freunden" is a wholly-owned production by Letterbox Filmproduktion, for which Executive Producer Michael Lehmann was able to bring other supporters and partners on board. First and foremost as co-producers are ZDF, which will be broadcasting "Tod von Freunden" from 7 February and making it available on demand in its media library, and Dynamic Television as world distributor. "Norbert Himmler and Simone Emmelius from ZDF were strong supporters of this project right from the start. Wolfgang Feindt and Daniel Blum were important partners at the broadcaster in our day-to-day work," says Lehmann. He is also particularly keen to recognise the achievement of Hamburg-based Director and Script Writer Friedemann Fromm as a "Hussar achievement", as he wrote all the books for the seven episodes himself and staged the family drama at the locations in the Flensburg Fjord: "The new series funding in Hamburg offers great opportunities for talent in the region and serves as a promotion of excellence with which an ambitious production location can present itself at an international level," says the Head of Production at Studio Hamburg.