Summer '76, there's a heatwave and the Swiss countryside is drying out at top speed. In this stifling environment, Gus who is thirteen years old and son of a farmer, sees both his family environment and his innocence relentlessly breaking. He's living the end of a world.
When married couple Egon and Maren lose their adult son, their family, which includes their daughter Lily, is paralyzed with grief. As it turns out, the three of them have very different ways of coping with grief and soon find themselves slipping apart. Now the three of them need to find their way back to life and to reconstitute the family.
Alfredo and Susanna are two well-off fifty-year-olds who lead a stimulating cultural life. He is an architect and she is a psychologist; they live in Rome but spend their weekends at their country home in Umbria, where they love to spend their days walking in the forests or relaxing poolside with a good book. One day, as she goes into town, Susanna sees a girl prostituting herself in the bushes on the side of the road and decides to save her from her unhappy existence, despite the enormous differences that separate their ways of life.
Young police chief Sandra Mohr returns to her hometown of Graz with a bad feeling. Together with her new boss, Sascha Bergmann, she is tasked with solving the death of a journalist who was planning to write an article on abuse of office and nepotism.
An illiterate and lonely man bonds with an older and well-read woman.
Marco, in his thirties, is a little lost and tormented at the thought of truly settling. A former war photographer, he no longer wants to cover conflict and is more interested in the world of longshiremen.
Kicki has after several years abroad returned to Sweden. Her 17-year old son has been brought up by his grandmother and has a very distant relationship to his mother. In an effort to get reacquainted Kicki invites her son to join her on vacation in Taiwan. But her hidden agenda is that Taipei is also the home of the Taiwanese businessman with whom she has been conducting an Internet romance.
Catalonian Paco is a traveling rep for a shoe manufacturer. When he stops to pick up Russian emigree hitchhiker Nino, Paco soon finds himself on the side of the road with everything stolen out from under him. Local gift shop owner Marinette gives the Spaniard a lift. Their mutual attraction manifests itself quickly, and Paco, who was fired over the stolen-car episode, hangs around. When he happens to spot Nino in the same town, he beats up the scrawny Russian, who lands in the hospital. Oddly enough, this marks the beginning of a beautiful friendship. Paco and Nino soon take the trip down the road together
A cross-country trip turns out to be a nightmare for a troubled couple.
