Maecenas Film- und Fernseh GmbH

One of the most spectacular and renowned conductors of the 1930s, Wilhelm Furtwangler's reputation rivaled that of Toscanini's. After the war, he was investigated as part of the Allies' de-Nazification programme. In the bombed-out Berlin of the immediate post-war period, the Allies slowly bring law and order to bear on an occupied Germany. An American major is given the Furtwangler file, and is told to find everything he can and to prosecute the man ruthlessly. Tough and hard-nosed, Major Steve Arnold sets out to investigate a world of which he knows nothing.

In Paris, near the end of World War II, crotchety professor Fernand Bonnard maintains a zoo and continues his research. He's a coward, as is his debonair son, Armand, who has one daughter, Philippine. On her eighth birthday, Armand picks her up from her repressive boarding school and takes her to Fernand's to celebrate. Father and son quarrel, and Armand leaves, only to be arrested and shot for violating curfew. In grief, the curmudgeonly Fernand does not tell Philippine, but invents a life for Armand as a captain of the Resistance. Fernand takes her from school to live with him and his sensible wife. Along the way, Philippine finds out the truth and Fernand discovers courage.