Gudrun is a teen-aged girl living in Germany during World War II. Her father is away serving in the army and her mother has sent her to a rural village to stay with her grandmother, a cafe proprietor. In that ironically idyllic setting, Gudrun frolics with a youth who yearns to join the Hitler Youth, though his father is a pastor who has been outspoken against the regime and will soon be arrested. Meanwhile, Gudrun's mother has been having an affair with an army officer. This causes grave difficulties when her husband, who has deserted and is hiding out in grannie's cellar, stumbles upon the couple.

Bernd, an insurance broker trainee, flees his mundane life in Germany to set a new World record in hang gliding in Bolivia.