Dorfpunks

It's the summer of 1984 in Schmalenstedt, right in the middle of Holsteinische Schweiz, the »little Switzerland« of Holstein on the coast of the Baltic sea. 17-year-old Malte Ahrens, who goes by the name of »Roddy Dangerblood«, lives with his leftwing parents in a farmhouse, is in the middle of his ceramics apprenticeship and has just discovered »punk«, which has finally made its way, with some delay, to Schmalenstedt. Living »punk« between fields and forests and hanging out drinking by the fire in their forest hideout talking about music and bands is not the only thing that defines the lives of Roddy and his friends. They are also involved in public provocations and scuffles with the other farm boys, which is met with disapproval and incomprehension by Roddy's parents. »This is what you call punk?« his father asks as Roddy comes home bruised and beaten from a fight. When the four friends are invited to a party, they ask themselves how to score with the girls. »We'll make music, we'll start a band!« comes their brilliant idea and when, after a long search, they finally decide on a band name, »Warhead«, their euphoria knows no bounds. At about the same time, Roddy meets Maria and falls head over heels in love with her. The band rehearsals turn out to be more difficult than they had imagined, and their first concert is a total disaster. Then after his friends completely thrash Maria's party, she doesn't want to have anything to do with him anymore. Despite the consolation and support he gets from the rather odd barkeeper Paul Mascher, Roddy soon realizes that the band is heading for an inevitable breakup and he senses the loss of his friendships. But then Roddy meets his neighbor Schwaster and finally manages to find his own definition of punk and with it a piece of freedom.

After completing his graduate degree in History, Politics and Philosophy, Lars Jessen began his film directing studies at the Academy of Media Arts in Cologne, Germany, where he worked with the likes of Horst Königstein, Alfred Biolek and Istvan Szabo. He graduated with the documentary film »Lübke - in search of President Heinrich Lübke«. After a directing internship on the set of »Lindenstrasse« and several projects where he worked as an assistant director for George Moorse, Lars Jessen finally took on the challenge of directing. Since then, he has directed numerous television productions which include more than 20 episodes of the ARD series »Großstadtrevier«, as well as »Tatort«, »Doppelter Einsatz«, »Der Dicke« and many more. He also wrote the scripts for several of these productions. He achieved great success with his cinema feature film »The Day Bobby Ewing died«, which ran at several film festivals around the world including Buenos Aires, Washington, Calcutta and Seoul as well as at the Cannes International Film Festival. The film was also awarded the Max Ophüls Prize. His current film is »Dorfpunks«, a film adaptation of the same named novel by Rocko Schamoni.

2008 »Die Schimmelreiter«, »Dorfpunks«
2004 »Am Tag als Bobby Ewing starb«, »Lübke - in search of President Heinrich Lübke«