Janina Grzegorczyk

At the turn of the century, Lodz, Poland, was a quick-paced manufacturing center for textiles, replete with cutthroat industrialists and unsafe working conditions. Three young friends, a Pole, a Jew, and a German, pool their money together to build a factory.

The problem of the Polish population displacement from their land within the limits of the Prussian partition. Germans come to the village harassing a wealthy peasant Snail, leading to the tragedy. Slug's cottage burns, his wife dies. The peasant does not give up, defending his inheritance. He sticks on a patch of his Polish soil and protects it like a soldier his post.

Two young boys living in a small town in the east of Poland try to survive the war by working as projectionists in a local cinema. They provide entertainment to Poles, Germans and Russians alike.