Manfred Falk is an experienced race car driver and member of a racing collective in Eisenach. While competing in West Germany, the beautiful Manuela convinces him to leave his girlfriend Inge and his friends at the collective behind in order to join the South American Alvarez racing company.

A refugee from a Nazi concentration camp is discovered by some boys in WWII Berlin. They provide him with food and help him to continue his flight. Later one of the boys, the son of a communist, is charged with theft, arrested and sent to a concentration camp.

Children's book illustrator Müller-Olbernhau has a secure livelihood in East Berlin. He and his wife Brigitte, who is very impressed by the "western glamor", are visited by Uncle Rüdiger Lorenz from the Rhine. Under their influence, he moves to West Germany, also annoyed by the publishing house and because, according to his wife, he lacks "pizzazz". There he was asked to illustrate comics with violent and cruel depictions for a Frankfurt publisher. He witnesses arguments between three other graphic artists and the publishing house manager. When he asks one of them, Hertwig, who is no longer "playing along", what he is doing now, he is told that he is going to a "real children's book publisher" in East Berlin. Brigitte is astonished: "Isn't that where we just came from?" As she looks at Leo in surprise, he writes on her forehead in lipstick: "That's it."