Family drama set in the Danish countryside in the turn of the century. A wealthy landowner is an evil and corrupt womaniser with several illegitimate offspring in addition to his beautiful family. Nobody stands up to him except his feisty 17-year-old daughter.

A tragedy by William Shakespeare about King Lear who intends to abdicate, and therefore wants to carve the kingdom up between his three daughters.

Hans and Lollo just had their first child. Hans is a gym teacher and is constantly tormented by his pupils. Hans's dad Bengt, is a news reporter on TV9, the channel who shows "such as people want to see". Bengt's latest report series is about a rapist who likes little girls. Bengt begins to suspect Hans...

Torun and Mikael have been married for a few years. When vacationing on the Danish coast, their young son Melker accidentally drowns. Torun initially blames her sister, who was supposed to supervise her children. Later she turns her anger and grief against her husband. Since none of them know what to do with their feelings, they start to drift apart.

Combining the exultant sweep of epic period drama with the subtle intimacy of biography in a social perspective, this is a tale of materially impoverished childhood, struggling early manhood and an unrequited first love turned into good musical fortune for Carl Nielsen, one of the great composers of the 20th century. Based on the composer's autobiography, the film itself is designed to soar like a symphony.