A coming-of-age story set in Germany in the 1960s. Siggi becomes involved in a love triangle when he falls for Luise, but the tightening political climate forces him to make a fateful decision.

The courageous young midwife Christine makes a pact with the devil to save her village from the brutal terror of the Teutonic Knights. Punished by a spider plague, Christine goes from savior to hunted.

The era of the feared sea pirates Klaus Störtebeker and Gödeke Michels is coming to an end. After a long period with no booty at last a bulging ship appears on the horizon. However, Störtebeker is badly wounded in the attempted capture and the pirates suffer ignominious defeat. Not only their ship is down the drain - Störtebeker himself is suddenly plagued by anxiety and doubt about his very existence as a pirate. He is drawn to the beautiful country girl Bille, while Michels gets rebuffed by the friesian princess Okka. In the very moment that the crew have mutinied and co-captain Michels is literally at the end of his tether, they discover on board their ramshackle old tub a most unique wonder weapon. Glory days are quickly revived - until the mighty Hanse consolidate their power and weaponry and go to war against the pirates. Störtebeker and Michels are forced to decide: To live as a farmer or to die as a pirate.

An insecure drama student is given the lead role in a play by her director, but the role she is supposed to play is at odds with her real personality. The fusion of her stage persona and her real life persona becomes a psychological tour de force for the young woman, changing her private life.

Eleven years ago, an 8-year-old girl disappeared from a small German town on the German-Czech border. Although her body was never found, nor were there any traces of blood or DNA evidence, a mentally-disabled man was coerced to confess to the crime. Even though he withdrew his admission of guilt two days later, the forced confession was enough to convince the ruling judge. The responsible investigator Altendorf was discharged so that the investigation could be sped along by another colleague.

In 1980s East Germany, Berlin doctor Barbara is banished to a country medical clinic for applying for an exit visa. Deeply unhappy with her reassignment and fearful of her co-workers as possible Stasi informants, Barbara stays aloof, especially from the good-natured clinic head, Andre.

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.

Rebecca Thalberg escapes from a psychiatric ward to finally clear up the dark history of her husband Henry's family in the Ore Mountains. The locals turn out to be secretive and hostile. However, the local forester immediately falls in love with the beautiful stranger and tells her about the legends surrounding the explosion of Thalberg's glassworks and the death of the patriarch. Thanks to Rebecca, mother-in-law Eleanor finally faces up to an old debt.

Heinz Gödicke is the chief commissioner of the People's Police in the small town of Eberswalde in Brandenburg. Gödicke is called when two bestial murdered children are found in the forest. The investigator tries to get involved in the perpetrators - a rarely used method at the People's Police - and the perpetrator so on the track. The Stasi-Major Witt is no friend of this procedure and leaves the commissioner only reluctantly free hand in the investigation. The matter does not go to the authorities fast enough and is then simply put to the files. When another murder occurs, it becomes clear that Gödicke was much closer to the enlightenment of the act than everyone thought.

The film tells different stories in a kind of parallel Germany about love, affection and hatred.