It is 1940. A young man is facing court martial on charges of conscientious objection. He admits the crime. The prosecutor demands a most severe punishment. While waiting for the verdict, the young man think back of his past. How could this happen?

"Seventh Heaven" - Famous radio personality Willy Lorens has a big success with the radio series "Seventh Heaven." The amount of fan mail and attention eventually becomes too much for Willy, who suffers a minor collapse. Taken to a hospital where he meets Dr. Lovisa Sundelius, virtually the only woman in Sweden who do not admire the radio idol.

Different groups of people gather on an island in Stockholm's archipelago for a night of fun.

At a summer-evening dance a young girl meets a man who tells her he is a doctor. They go off together, and after that she never sees him again. She learns that she is pregnant and inquires about him at various hospitals, with no success. She reads of his engagement and becomes acquainted with another girl with a situation like her own.

The school counselor Vanja believe neither in love, marriage or a woman's subservient role to the man. One day she meets the student Björn. Their romance is full of problems. Along comes a man from Vanjas past.

Orphan girl Gunilla (nick named Kulla-Gulla) gets sent from her orphanage to work as an housemaid at sharecropper Karlbergs household. Among her duties is to take care of Karlberg, his wife and their five children.

When disillusioned Swedish knight Antonius Block returns home from the Crusades to find his country in the grips of the Black Death, he challenges Death to a chess match for his life. Tormented by the belief that God does not exist, Block sets off on a journey, meeting up with traveling players Jof and his wife, Mia, and becoming determined to evade Death long enough to commit one redemptive act while he still lives.