Known for Acting
1958: during the Russian campaign, a military priest is called upon to assist Private Baranowski, who has been sentenced to death for desertion, on his last night. It is also the last night before the departure for Stalingrad, which the soldiers know means certain death. The priest leaves his room to a captain so that he can meet his fiancée one last time. He himself remains in Baranowski's cell and struggles with his conscience and his emotion - even more so when he learns that the young doomed man committed desertion out of love. But the execution is carried out, and a member of the firing squad finds only cynical words for the soldier's fate.
In the 1800s, a stormy love relationship develops quickly between a young medical student and a woman believing herself to be the daughter of his scientist uncle, the student having never heard of her before their chance encounter and both unaware that she is the result of the scientist's illegal experiments with artificial insemination..
It’s 1910 and we’re in the duchy of Lauffenburg. Everybody is celebrating the 600th birthday of the local hero, Otto the Ironman, who in his time saved the duchy from annexation and beat the enemy so badly, that he fled ... well, that’s what it says in the history books, at least. Local gossip asserts, however, that Otto wasn’t even part of the battle and was spending his time having fun with a pretty girl. When one day a piece is introduced at the court theatre, which tells the heroic story of Otto, the director rejects the mediocre story.
Flanders, Hispanic Monarchy, 1616. The inhabitants of the small town of Boom are busy organizing the annual local festivities when the arrival of the Duke of Olivares, who rules the country on behalf of the King Philip III of Spain, is announced. While the male citizens cowardly surrender to panic, the brave female citizens decide to become the best hosts the Spaniards can ever meet. (German version of the French film La Kermesse héroïque, 1935.)
At a mine on the shared edge of France and Germany, an underground explosion leads to the entrapment of a group of French miners. In an effort to save the trapped Frenchmen, German miners Wittkopp and Kasper take it upon themselves to traverse a crumbling war tunnel leading down into the mines. Yet, though the workers harbor no political biases against one another, their callous, less tolerant bosses hope to halt this cross-cultural rescue mission.
