In the mid-1950s, mayor Zwischenzahl is killed on the day of his inauguration in a West German town. The killer is Ruth Bodenheim, a Jewish woman, who wanted to avenge the death of her parents. Zwischenzahl, a former SA member, was apparently involved in the deportation of her parents to a concentration camp during the war. Ruth cannot bear the horrible events and the death of her parents and wants to open the eyes of the town′s residents.

Diederich Heßling is scared of everything and everyone. But as he grows up, he comes to realize that he has to offer his services to the powers-that-be if he wants to wield power himself. His life motto now runs: bow to those at the top and tread on those below. In this way, he always succeeds: as a student in a duel-fighting student fraternity and as a businessman in a paper factory. He cajoles the obese district administrative president Von Wulkow and wins his favor. He slanders his financial rivals and hatches a plot with the social democrats in the town council. On his honeymoon with his rich wife Guste, he finally finds a chance to do his beloved Kaiser a favor. And when a memorial to the Kaiser is unveiled in the town where Diederich lives and works, he delivers the address. He stands behind the lectern in the pouring rain, saluting his Kaiser. The crowd is dispersed. Everything is laid in ruins...

The widowed registrar Robert Zimmermann reconciles divorcing couples and finds happiness in love once again.

Last years in the Life of german Dramatican Georg Büchner. Around the year 1830 he and his fellow students try to initiate a revolution in Germany, but they are not successful. Büchner has to leave the country and seeks exile in France and Switzerland, where he falls ill with typhus.