Found happiness yet?

Great article, Charly, thanks so much.

I'm glad that Ulrike Folkerts is finally so comfortable with herself and with being an out lesbian. It seems to me that she's been like that since being in that new relationship. I remember earlier interviews in which she was almost unbearable to watch, very frustrated with her role on Tatort and the roles that were and were not offered to her. Luckily, she has been in some very good movies lately, and the Tatort episodes get better again as well.

She has every reason to be happy. :)

~ Be who you are, whoever you are. ~

I still remember not having a clue when everybody was talking about “UFO” back then. My excuse? I was living in the midst of France, didn’t have television at all and had never seen a Tatort with Ulrike Folkerts. But I was quickly convinced what I’d been missing, when I was visiting “home” and stumbled upon an episode with her.

Sadly though, I didn’t like the “Tatort”s from 3-4 years ago and haven’t yet found to time to watch later ones.

What I wasn’t aware of, until your article, that she is/was seen as a role model. I’d always tagged her as an object of desire.

@MEL: What are the titles of the films you mentioned? We had this discussion just yesterday (re article in “Stern”) and came up all blank, except for the ones we didn’t like at all, because of that feeling “Kommissarin Odenthal” is playing in a movie. She’s so branded by this role, that it’s difficult imagining her in another (believable) role. But, that’s the job of the director as well.

http://spoilmyself.blogspot.com/ http://strawberrysaffron.blogspot.com/

Any chanche that we not-Germans can watch somewhere the Tatort movies? On the channel website? Or  You Tube?

You could try on http://www.rtsi.ch/.

TSI1 and TSI2 are the Italian versions of Swiss television, and they often show German TV-series dubbed into Italian.

Or else, if you have satellite TV and are positioned on Astra or Eutelsat (13°) you might catch the original German versions, next premiere  will be aired on 5th October by ARD there’ll be a rerun in the same evening on ARD Digital (EinsFestival). The regional stations belonging to ARD (German public television) often show reruns of the films as well.

As for online resources, I didn’t find anything worth watching. If you’re looking for a “Tatort” you should know that this is a series which has its own detectives in the different cities. You should be looking for a “Tatort” from Ludwigshafen.

You can get a clue from a Lena Odenthal "Tatort" if you go to the ARD Website here and click to the button "Mediathek". Search for Lena Odenthal und you will see a little trailer from an old episode "Unter Kontrolle"

It is not a full episode, but a chance to see at least a bit of her acting abilities. And by the way, she is the one with the short hair. After the shooting for that Tatort episode she started to grow her hair. It's now longer with curls. Still nice looking .

"Die Leibwächterin" is currently available on YouTube, watch part 1 at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4w3GAy9-tMw. I don't know how long it wil stay there though.

There might be one possibility for watching upcoming Tatort-Shows outside of Germany: The legal(!) website http://www.onlinetvrecorder.com allows you to "record" shows that run on free German TV-stations and you can download them to your computer. The service works in Austria, so it might work with other ip addresses as well.

Always look on the bright side of life *pfeifpfeif*

"Because when we turn around to look for the younger lesbians who are visible in the media in Germany we won’t find anyone."

Ain't it true and a shame really 'cause I can find objects of desire among a whole bunch of (straight) actresses and I can find some (straight) role-models out there, as well - but I'd just love to have at least one woman who I can look up to who shares my loving and desiring women.

"It seems that you have to have „achieved something in life“, to have
wrinkles, money and a certain reputation to be allowed to out yourself."

Oh yes, and unfortunately I am guilty of a similar behaviour sometimes. I'm totally open about being gay, but I usually feel a lot more comfortable about talking about my girlfriend when I've already established some bond with the other person - gained some reputation, one could say.

So I'm sometimes wondering if "the media" are setting the rules about an accepted outing or if we gay women tend to think we need some kind of acceptance first that can't be taken away when we finally out ourselves. I know that such thinking stems from the stereotype that all women want to be loved and accepted but I guess that's a stereotype not so far from the truth. Or it is just me acting silly from time to time :)