The main characters of the story are Pauli, a teacher's son, and Sepp, the son of a sawmill owner. They get to know each other while serving as altar boys, become friends and decide to form their own gang with themselves as leaders. Their first major objective will be a battle against a notorious gang from the neighboring village . . .

In this well-photographed and sometimes confusing wartime drama, an Austrian village experiences the tragedy of war on several different levels. Within one family, the younger son is jealous of the praise his father gives to a Polish POW who is working for them under very difficult conditions. Within the village as a whole, the French, Polish, and Russian POWs are kept under guard by Nazi soldiers, creating a tense situation all around. But more importantly, the village has conspired to hide an Austrian deserter in a cave up in the mountains. This act of rebellion on the part of the deserter and the village hangs in a precarious balance that could be upset by a single traitorous comment to the Gestapo.