Colognian commissioner Gereon Rath moves to Berlin, the epicenter of political and social changes in the Golden Twenties.

In late-1920s Berlin, Franz Biberkopf is released from prison and vows to go straight. However, he soon finds himself embroiled in the city's criminal underworld.

The film chronicles the rise and fall of Germany's most famous a capella group, the Comedian Harmonists, in 1930s Germany.

Seitz has been abusing his underage daughter for years and is the father of her first child. He is a brutal perpetrator of violence and has several relevant criminal records. When Tanja confides in her new boyfriend, he persuades her to go to the police. Seitz is sentenced and threatens to beat Tanja to death while still in court. Tanja and her boyfriend have long been married and have children of their own when, after seven years, fate catches up with them again: they are terrified of Seitz, who is soon released from prison and threatens revenge. Tanja and her family turn to the authorities in vain. They can only intervene if there is a concrete threat. But then it will be too late, Tanja fears. Too late for her children and herself. Together, the family gets a rifle...

In the little town of Herzsprung - whose name harks back to an ancient legend of broken hearts - almost nothing has changed since German unification, except a rise in unemployment. Johanna, a young mother and widow, becomes one of the unemployed and lives on welfare. To make matters worse, she falls in love with a dark-skinned, roving adventurer and the whole village starts talking about it.

1952, Paris. Nadia, a Red Diaper baby, has a sister, Polish parents, and at 15 is an active Communist. When cops beat her during an anti-American demonstration, she's rescued by a "Match" photographer. As the friendship becomes a love affair and her slogans are tested by new knowledge and emotion, some of the Red youth want to expel her. When she goes with Stéphane to a seaside photo shoot, her father goes to the police. Stéphane faces charges, so leaving to cover the war in Indochina looks appealing. In a parallel story, Nadia's mother meets again her prewar lover, released from Siberia, who challenges the French Reds with very real scars and word of Stalin's anti-Semitism.

A World War II German U-Boat crew have a terrifying patrol mission in the early days of the war.

As the Germans invade Poland Jewish Ruth and her mother are trapped by the oncoming Nazis. When they are loaded onto a truck for transportation to a ghetto, Ruth is told by her mother to jump from the truck at the first chance and to make her way to relatives in Warsaw. While the war progresses Ruth tries to survive and grow up.

The Earth shortly before its end. The houses in the cities are deserted, the streets smashed. The sky shimmers dark gray.

The claustrophobic world of a WWII German U-boat; boredom, filth and sheer terror.

A tramp tries to trick the community into paying for the funeral of his fellow tramp who was found frozen to death.

Maria marries a young soldier in the last days of World War II, only for him to go missing in the war. She must rely on her beauty and ambition to navigate the difficult post-war years alone.

After the death of her abusive father, the lonely librarian Martha marries an equally vile businessman - Helmut. The cruel and torturous nature of their relationship leads Martha to believe Helmut might be trying to kill her.

An ambitious photo-journalist creates his own stories to get sensational scoops.