Tobi and Achim, the pride of the local crew club, have been the best of friends for years and are convinced that nothing will ever stand in the way of their friendship. They look forward to the upcoming summer camp and the crew competition. Then the gay team from Berlin arrives and Tobi is totally confused. The evening before the races begin, the storm that breaks out is more than meteorological.

Eight people on a journey across Germany. Each has a destination in mind, each has worries as well as wishes. Fate brings them together. The carpooling agency throws them together in three cars. They have to spend several hours together in a very confined space. A shy wallflower, a pushy swimwear salesman, a boy who wants to get out of the provinces for a weekend... Their lives become intertwined for a few hours during the trip. But how do such different people fit together at all? This question is the source of the movie's suspense.

In the loneliness of the Lower Havel lowlands, one of the last bird paradise in Germany, twelve-year-old Lea lives alone with her father Lutz, a passionate environmentalist. She is on the cusp of adulthood, confronted with the challenges of the present and the pains of the past. She often feels lonely in the childhood-remote world in which she lives, in which schools are closed and people leave. Even the father, who has withdrawn from the world, is increasingly becoming a problem for Lea, who longs for fellowship.

In this vivid historical drama set in 1980s East Germany, two dockworkers and best friends who dream of escaping the repressive regime are forced to choose their loyalties when the state police promise them safe passage out of the country — if they inform on their co-workers and union leader.