In 1984 East Berlin, an agent of the secret police, conducting surveillance on a writer and his lover, finds himself becoming increasingly absorbed by their lives.
Two families attempt a daredevil plan to escape the GDR with a homemade hot air balloon, but it crashes just before the border. The Stasi finds traces of this attempt to escape and immediately starts investigations, while the two families are forced to build a new escape balloon. With each passing day the Stasi is closer on their heels – a nerve-wracking race against time begins.
Stalinstadt, East Germany, 1956. While the Hungarian uprising against Soviets is taking place, teenage members of a classroom of the local school perform a seemingly harmless act that causes unexpected consequences.
In 1980s East Germany, Barbara is a Berlin doctor banished to a country medical clinic for applying for an exit visa. Deeply unhappy with her reassignment and fearful of her co-workers as possible Stasi informants, Barbara stays aloof, especially from the good natured clinic head, Andre.
Former East Germany, 1992. Patrick Stein and Markus Bach, two very different police officers, are commissioned to investigate the disappearance of two female teenagers in a remote area of the country. Did they run away from home or did something more terrible happen to them?
One evening in the mid-sixties, Rolf Anschütz, a chef who runs a small restaurant in a town called Suhl in the middle of the East German province of Thuringen offers his guests a unique and exotic meal - Japanese Sukiyaki. It was intent to be a surprise for some of his best customers and it became a great success. Even the local paper wrote about it - and this should change the life of Rolf Anschütz forever.
Set in the Summer of 1988 and based on real events, the film tells the story of East-German twins Isabel and Doreen, two aspiring oarswomen, whose lives are changed dramatically during a training camp at Lake Balaton in Hungary. There, the girls make the acquaintance of West-German friends Arne and Nico. The holiday flirt soon turns serious when Doreen and Arne fall in love. As the end of their stay approaches, Arne asks the inseparable sisters to flee to the West with him…
East Germany, 1988: working as a state security service agent, Jürgen Kaiser is loyal to the party line, but worried about his son Marco, a punk. As he is arrested after a concert, Marco is forced to join the army, where he surprisingly identifies with socialism and believes he has to defend his country against the capitalist enemy. While Jürgen is astonished, his wife Hanna and Marco's girlfriend Anja, supporting the civil rights movement, don't like his new attitude...