Ivo Fici

In northern Croatia, a typical problem pops out during the engagement between two neighbors, a widower and a pregnant woman.

The story begins in a small rural village in Ladimirevci, Eastern Croatia in 1943, where a land owner Sima is helping the Partisan Movement and the official Ustasha regime in order to save the life of his son Beneš, who is enlisted in the German army. Sima doesn't want to let his son fight for the wrong side any more, and doesn't want to give him to the Partisans either, so he hides him in his attic for the time being. The story is interwoven with episodes of Sima trying to muster a beautiful stallion - Sokol - who only answers to his son Beneš and clearly doesn't like his old man.

Branko Kralj is an alienated businessman and avid chess fan. He is married to the attractive Visnja and they have a son. Their marriage is weak and Branko feels much closer to his mistress than to his wife. One day Kralj and Visnja travel on a half empty train. Kralj goes to a far away compartment for a game of chess, and leaves Visnja alone. Three men take advantage of the lone woman in her compartment and rape her.

Valent is a night shift worker who can barely feed his family. To add the insult to injury, every night he must pass near the butcher's shop with meat products he can't afford. But one night the shop is a scene of a gangland shooting. Valent picks up the bag full of money and a gun, and his life changes.

After serving the prison time, a man turns for help to his friend who is in a high position. But the friendship that once bound them becomes a burden for the high-positioned man.

A young professor of art history is pressed by communist superiors to write a positive review to an amateur scholar. He plays with an old man as well as with a young worker girl until he realizes he has lost everything.

It’s the winter of 1942. A freight train on the section of the Slavonian railway Vinkovci-Nova Gradiska is under a special Gestapo escort. Fleeing misfortune and evil brought by war, the last wagon is the place of encounter of politicians, war smugglers, deserters and tamburitza players.

During the WWII, the communist resistance, with the help of a few local anti-fascists, makes sabotage and obstructs the actions of the Yugoslav quislings.

The film deals with issues of life and work in self-governing socialist enterprises, i.e. the problems caused by the application of the Law on Associated Labor which passed several years before. The protagonists are the metal company workers who are launching a strike due to the reduction of salaries.

In 1928 young Communist activist was arrested and put on trial for anti-state activity. Years later he became known as Tito, Communist president of Yugoslavia, and this TV-movie was made for the 50th anniversary of those events.