On the occasion of their daughter's birth, the king and queen give a lavish feast. Among the guests are twelve fairies who endow the infant in the cradle with all good qualities. As the king loathes diligence, he does not invite the thirteenth fairy - the fairy of diligence. A captain lets her slip into the castle and she casts a spell on Sleeping Beauty, wishing death upon her. The twelfth fairy transforms and mitigates the spell. On the day she turns fifteen, the princess is to sink into a hundred-year sleep after pricking her finger on a spindle.

During the Greek summer in the war year of 1944, a German military unit sets up camp on the plateau of Thebes. Armed with a 16 mm camera, the captain of the unit, a former professor for classical Greek philology, comes up with the idea to film the myth of Oedipus.

The year 1933: Successful actress Maria Rheine is in love with her Jewish colleague Mark Löwenthal. When the Nazis implement the racist Nuremberg Laws, their relationship is severely endangered. Defiant Maria decides to stay together with Mark and ends her promising career: She assumes a Jewish identity and continues to work under the name Manja Löwenthal. She and Mark perform at the Jewish Theatre in Berlin, until they become victims of an intrigue: Their colleague Judith, who has a crush on Mark, denounces them to the secret police.

Ekke and Karsten are newcomers to the shipyard. Paddy claims to have heard it on Rügen radio. But the two did not fall on their heads, even if they still fear that their accommodation, the "Fritz Heckert" accommodation ship, could be - as it is called - a "working-class monastery". Not only do they find out from Paddy that such worries are unfounded, they experience it for themselves.

Two farmers, Grimm and Melcher, were once on friendly terms, but a petty argument over a piece of land has since turned them into implacable enemies. Their two children- Veronika and Fabian- used to be childhood friends. When they meet again as young adults, they instantly fall in love, despite the bitter feud between their families. With no hope for a future together, the two seek to end their lives in this retelling of the classic story by Shakespeare.

A funny adventures of a two young boys who are trying to rebuild the ship called "Emma" for their friend - the old captain.

In 1920, Michael, the son of a German laboring man, decides to travel to Russia. As "red horseman" he wants to support the socialist revolution and fight for the welfare of the working class. The journey towards the east turns out to be both a big adventure and a severe ethical test for the young man. He has to escape the German Armed Forces and ends up at a traveling circus where he falls in love with Fanny, a dressage rider. He overcomes the temptation to stay with her at the circus and - after briefly joining a gang of teenage thieves - he eventually boards a ship heading east. Aboard the ship he finds out that the seamen are transporting weapons for the hostile members of the White Army.

To gain lands from the prince of Saxony, a group of orphans seeks Mozart, in order to obtain the very rare score of one of his compositions.

The life of Alexander von Humboldt up to his attempt to climb the Chimborazo in 1802.