48-year-old Irene Rakowitz is a divorcee with 4 children who lives off a disability pension. Her two grown-up daughters have moved out, so she lives with her third daughter and youngest son, while her ex-husband who is a former miner lives downstairs. The two daughters who have moved out hate their mother and call her a "troublemaker" while Irene is hurt by what her daughters say about her.  Director Helga Reidemeister, who had been a social worker, films and presents an unfiltered look at the daily life of Irene Rakowitz' family who live in welfare housing right outside of Berlin. The fluctuating emotions of a divorcee raising her kids in her late forties, her two daughters who attack her for not doing anything significant, and a young son who is petrified at the sight of his violent mother compose a hellish family on camera. It is doubtful that there would be any other film as controversial as this documentary about 'family' by a female director in the late 1970s. 

Helga Reidemeister (1940~) Born in Halle, Germany
Helga Reidemeister studied painting at the University of Fine Arts in Berlin and worked on restoring paintings but was influenced by the Student Movement and did social work in Maerkisches Viertel, a satellite district of West Berlin. She went in to learn about the lives of the working class and began making a film with residents who questioned her with comments like "They try to make films about us but they never make films with us. They don't even show what we really want to show." and directed Der Gekaufte Traum and Is This Fate?