In 1920s Ireland young doctor Damien O'Donovan prepares to depart for a new job in a London hospital. As he says his goodbyes at a friend's farm, British Black and Tans arrive, and a young man is killed. Damien joins his brother Teddy in the Irish Republican Army, but political events are soon set in motion that tear the brothers apart.

Determined to have a normal family life once his mother gets out of prison, a Scottish teenager from a tough background sets out to raise the money for a home.

Narrowly avoiding jail, new dad Robbie vows to turn over a new leaf. A visit to a whisky distillery inspires him and his mates to seek a way out of their hopeless lives.

When Kelly meets Victor on the dance floor of a Liverpool nightclub, the attraction is instant. After wandering through the night they find themselves at her flat, making love with a passion and urgency that neither had experienced before. Both Kelly and Victor are struggling to get by as best they can, while the people around them are choosing illegal lifestyles; she is escaping a brutish former lover, while he is being dragged into a world of drugs. It's when they make love that their darker instincts take over.

Joseph is a man plagued by a violence and rage who is driving him to self destruction. As he falls further into turmoil, Joseph scours the landscape in search of a single grain of redemption that might restore hope to his fractured life.

The interweaving stories of seven very different people in the cosmopolitan city of Glasgow who decide that, in their pursuit of love, it is time to try something new. Little do they know that after one night of speed dating their lives will take dramatic new twists - and we'll be there to witness each and every one of them.

A train travels across Italy toward Rome. On board is a professor who daydreams a conversation with a love that never was, a family of Albanian refugees who switch trains and steal a ticket, three brash Scottish soccer fans en route to a match, and a complaining widow traveling to a memorial service for her late husband who's accompanied by a community-service volunteer who's assisting her. Interactions among these Europeans turn on class and nationalism, courtesy and rudeness, and opportunities for kindness.

A story centered on a young woman targeted by her family for an "honour killing" and the bounty hunter who takes the job.

Teenager Chris McMillan desperately tries to stop his older brother joining a Glasgow gang, only to end up becoming a part of his violent initiation.