A thief commits daring robberies (a la Raffles) in Slovenia during the 1920s. While he romances the ladies a persistent detective tries to hunt him down and bring him to justice.
In 1973 Vietnam, gas bombs are dropped on villages, killing men, women, and children. Two downed American pilots, accused of the bombings, are captured and tortured.
Lucia (Natassja Kinski) is a volatile, exciteable young woman. She forms a romance with Carlo (Stefano Dionisi), who is somewhat callow and is very skittish.
On a West German Autobahn, Robert plummets from a bridge and is hospitalized. As he recovers, he flashes back to a Bulgarian holiday where he met Jutta and her uncle Lothar, who’d ordered a West German passport to smuggle her out of the DDR.
Andreas, who is ten, has been brought up by his grandmother. When she dies, he removes a putto from the crucifix placed upon her, puts it in his mouth and does not speak again.