When watching Jagdrevier again for writing the summary, which was very nice, because I like this film very much, I noticed that this will be difficult for people, who don't speak German or know the regional peculiarities of the different parts of Germany.
Jagdrevier was made in 1972 by Wolfgang Petersen.The film is part of a series of murder-mysteries called Tatort, which is still continuing today. The individual films are not episodes with the same characters all the time, they are made in turn by all the regional stations in Germany, so they always have a distinct and typical local setting and people talking in the regional dialect. Each station has its own Kommissar (police inspector) and some of them, of course, are more popular than others. Kommissar Fincke from Jagdrevier was one of the popular ones.
Wolfgang Petersen made several Tatort-episodes for the northern German station in the seventies, which are still shown here and there, because they were very good and they were probably the reason, why he was given the chance to make Das Boot. (By the way: Petersen discovered Nastassja Kinski, she had her first appearance in a Tatort film). Jagdrevier is not only interesting as a mystery, it is also very funny, because the people in this village in northern Germany are so well portrayed (without making them ridiculous, Wolfgang Petersen is one of them himself), their habit of not talking anymore then is absolutely necessary is, of course, not very helpful for the investigation. Jürgen manages to blend in completely with these local characters and is a wonderful unshaved layabout.
It is all very much like a western film: Jürgen is the outwardly rough outlaw, who deep down is an honest and noble soul (well, in his own way). He is up against the respected local cattle baron, who is in reality absolutely mean and rapes young girls! The sheriff realizes this and ends up sympathizing with the villain, he is supposed to catch. I especially like the end, where the police is scouring the countryside, while Jürgen calmly walks into the saloon to give himself up!
It's clear that I missed out badly with this one, not understanding the language. I couldn't help but enjoy watching it, though, being largely an action film with Jürgen looking like a complete mess, running around like a champion (god, that man can run!) and chomping his food like a barbarian. I've had information from two sources now indicating that there is plenty of enjoyable dry wit in the script; I was at least able to get a laugh out of watching Jürgen's abysmal target practice with the tin can!