The river Oder between Poland and Germany marks a crossroads between two worlds. It draws people from all walks of life on their journey towards imagined happiness, security, and a better life in the West, It′s a place where Ukrainian refugees beg and bargain and pin all their hopes on Polish help... A place where a hapless businessman loses everything he owns but gains something more important Where a teen-aged cigarette smuggler defies his father and brother to free the girl he loves from a detention center... Where an interpreter risks her career and her freedom to help an illegal refugee... And where an architect meets his former girlfriend and discovers that they′ve both changed too much to find common ground for a new start. Director Schmid brings realism and compassion to his characters′ struggle to maintain their dignity and morals. And he wisely keeps the emotional tensions of the interconnecting stories as important as the film′s political message.