A German Child

The small town of Herxheim, not far from the French border, 1948: the only thing Liese still has of her son, the little Johannes, is his name. And the memory of his blue eyes. He got them from his father, a soldier in the occupying French forces, and the love of Liese’s life. They had dreamt of a life together in Paris, until he was suddenly redeployed. Liese would never see him again. When Johannes is two years old, he is torn away from his mother as part of a large-scale programme by the French government. He became a »French« child and was put up for adoption in France under a new name.

California, 2026: Johannes – who grew up in Burgund as André – has made a new life for himself in the US as a winemaker. But he has never been able to fully heal from that early, brutal separation from his loving mother. As he approaches his 80th birthday, he asks his granddaughter, Maya, to look for traces of his mother. In Herxheim, Maya delves deep into André’s past. But before too long, she realises she is also finding her own happiness.

A woman whose child is taken away from her. A son who is haunted by this trauma his whole life. The heart-rending fate of a broken family, moving from the turmoil and chaos of postwar Germany to present-day California.