The story takes place before World War II and centers on Pawel, a member of a conservative, middle-class family, and his love for Lidka, a taxi dancer. Social conventions and the lovers' inability to defy those forces Pawel and Lidka benefit. Times change, war breaks out, leading to Pawel sent to...
One night in 1950 a passenger train runs over a man, who turns out to be the veteran train engineer Władysław Orzechowski, knows for his old ways and stern demeanor. As the inquiry panel tries to deduce why would a man like Orzechowski jump in front of a moving train several of the people...
To convince the prison warden against releasing him, a middle-aged Polish man recounts his life, one he considers to have been characterized by exceptionally bad luck.
Three separate short stories about young athletes who lose their chances of success. Young swimmer - because of unhappy love. Boxer because of a fight with hooligans, for which the judges will disqualify him. But the cyclist must decide for himself what is more important for him: victory or...
Diver Antoni Barnat is falsely accused of causing an accident underwater that almost led to his fellow diver's death. Interestingly enough, they are both in love with the same girl, Teresa.
A factory foreman discovers (to his discontent) that his housewife secretly takes driving lessons in order to get a job and send their son to kindergarten.
The first Polish post-war comedy. Witek and Krysia, a married couple, move to Warsaw and have nowhere to stay. They rent a room in a house with many other lodgers. Witek dreams of their own house and draws a sketch of their future home, marking the place where his wife will sleep with the word...
The hero of the story is the writer Vladimír Tůma, who is invited to spend a month studying in a neighbouring country. There, the foreign office assigns him a guide, Irena Stepowska. The two young people are attracted to each other, but there is a catch - Vladimír is married, Irena is married....
The story of the tumultuous relationship between a Jewish girl called Noemi and a Polish art student named Kamil is set at the outbreak of World War II.