Keine Insel - Die Palmers Entführung 1977

While the RAF seems to be shaking the foundations of democracy in the ”German Autumn“, Austria episodically becomes a secondary scene of events. Three young men, Thomas Gratt, Othmar Keplinger and Reinhard Pitsch, all three from a student milieu, come into contact almost accidentally with members of the armed underground of the ”Movement of June 2nd“. In the night of 9 November 1977, they kidnap the industrialist Walter Michael Palmer and return him to his family after 100 hours in exchange for a ransom of 31 million shillings. They are caught soon afterwards and sentenced to many years in prison. Austria is ”hysterical“, as Bruno Kreisky remarks with some irritation in the opening sequence. After all, the country is ”no island“. (Gunnar Landsgesell)