Paolo Sanseviero is a professor at a German university and more married to his profession than to his wife. Martina decides to leave her husband. But it happens differently.
After the death of his father, the ambitious farmhand Hauke Haien works his way up to become the successor to the old dyke count, whose daughter Elke he marries. He develops plans for the construction of a new dyke to provide better protection against storm surges, but encounters resistance and...