The Riddle of the Sphinx

In Russia shortly before the outbreak of the First World War, Princess Vorontsov (Ellen Richter) is in love with a high-ranking officer of the tsarist army. When he is murdered, she craves revenge. The leading suspect is a lawyer with ties to nihilist revolutionaries. On behalf of the secret police, she travels to Switzerland in order to gain his trust and facilitate his arrest. Too late she realizes that she has been toyed with all along. Her fiancé was not the man she thought she was.

A power plant worker (Garrison) eagerly joins a strike for higher wages. When his young daughter falls severely ill and needs emergency surgery, the strike he helped organize shuts down the city's power grid. The operating room plunges into darkness during the critical procedure. Overcome by the tragedy, the worker is convinced by his wife (Porten) to abandon the strike.

A production company holds a public competition for film ideas. The winning letter tells of a young woman's lost love in the 1840's. It is, in fact, the true story of a now elderly woman's life.

Major industrialist Rimay fights a ruthless economic rivalry with competitor de Jong. The villainous Rimay tries to steal de Jong's Moroccan mines by inciting local Rif kabyles to rebel. Ellen Richter stars as Zoraja, navigating the high-stakes corporate and international conflict.

The story moves deeper into North Africa and Europe, following dangerous escapades and confrontations. Plots thicken around the control of the mines and the shifting loyalties of the characters involved.