Karl-Heinz Merz

The third episodic film, after Deutschland im Herbst and Der Kandidat, in which notable German filmmakers reflect on the state of their country. A collage of documentary and dramatised sequences dealing with such topics as overkill, peace demonstrations, NATO arms policy, and life after the next war.

Born into a well-off family, Franz Blum had led a carefree youth until, some time after graduating from high school, he was arrested by the police. For, involved by a gang of bad boys, the young man had taken part in a bank robbery. A "heroic deed" which earned him six years in prison. Once behind bars, he was treated with ruthless inhumanity by the guards. And little by little - but inexorably - Franz turned into an insurgent...

Ruth is the wife of well-heeled corsetry manufacturer Erich Halbfass. As business booms, Erich lives frivolously and their daughter Aglaia attends school. The bored middle-class wife begins a secret affair with Aglaia's drawing teacher, setting murder and manslaughter in motion.

In an attempt to escape 19th-century poverty, eight farmers and day laborers attack a prince's money transport in the Hessian Hinterland.