Early 1921: a man is on his way home. Gleb Chumalov, regimental commander, worker and Hero of the Order of the Red Banner, returns to his home town from the Civil War. The victory over the enemies of the Russian people gives him the conviction that a new, better time will dawn overnight. Gleb looks for his comrades from earlier years, but only finds people who are emaciated by their efforts. The cement works where he used to work has been plundered and abandoned. With great effort, Gleb and his comrades try to get the plant up and running again. The struggle seems to begin anew... It is the time after the victory of the “Great October Socialist Revolution“ and the time of building a new society.

The director of an art museum in Thuringia and an art dealer from Constance entered into an extremely lucrative business relationship. Director Trützschler illegally supplies Ms. Münzenberg with valuable works of art, which she smuggles into West Germany through an intermediary, abusing the transit routes. The business flourishes until they both fall into the CIA's intricate web. They are put under pressure and used to recruit a scientist from Jena. Will the GDR security forces succeed in thwarting the CIA's espionage operation...?

In a remote Prussian village, the shepherd Krischan with his fantastic stories is the attraction point for the children. One day they experience together how the Müller Düker beats his horse to death and intervene. Düker sues her for body injury at the district court, and because the main accused, Krischan, lives illegally in the village without papers, the village community decides to deport him before the trial. Krischan disappears. The children feel the loss painfully, are outraged by the adults. The boys Martin and John search for Krischan on an adventurous ride and are put by the police. Krischan remains gone.

During the Napoleanic Wars, members of the Prussian Lützow Free Corps steal a French war chest from the house of collaborator Kerstinn, but their captain Friesen is captured and sentenced to death. But Friesen is saved by French Sergeant Fleuron and they flee the occupied city together. Kerstinn's daughter Marie is disgusted by her father's disloyalty and has also fallen in love with Friesen. When she learns about a trap that is being set for Lützow Free Corps, she sets out to warn them with the help of her father's clerk Püttchen, a Lützow sympathizer.

Bruno Kappel is an established attorney in Hamburg who, in earlier times, belonged to an anarchistic student circle. His former girlfriend Karin Kunze is still a member of this scene. Bruno, who still has left-wing beliefs, becomes her attorney. But when Karin gets into a shootout with the police, she has to go into hiding. The prosecuting attorney Baller has also been a former member of the anarchistic scene. He does not want his past to be revealed by Karin′s apprehension and prosecution. Thus, he asks Kappel to find Karin and sneak her out to a foreign country.

A tailor drives his three sons out of the house because he believes they have maliciously starved his beloved goat. The sons prove themselves abroad and return home with special gifts. Two of the brothers are cheated out of their wages on the way. The youngest brother exposes and punishes the thief, and everyone can enjoy the miraculous gifts.

Famous Nazi doctor Josef Mengele — the 'Death Angel of Auschwitz', who killed more than 300.000 people — emerges from his hideout in Argentina to Germany as a 87-year-old man, and must stand for his crimes in court. The young solicitor Peter Rohm is assigned to defend him, but Rohm himself — an expert on Mengele and his crimes — feels unable to do so. When he decides to take on the case, he endangers not only his marriage but also his and his wife's lives.