Anger rages in Philip as he awaits the publication of his second novel. He feels pushed out of his adopted home city by the constant crowds and noise, a deteriorating relationship with his photographer girlfriend Ashley, and his own indifference to promoting the novel. When Philip's idol Ike Zimmerman offers his isolated summer home as a refuge, he finally gets the peace and quiet to focus on his favorite subject: himself.
Ken, a WWII GI, returns home after he's paralyzed in battle. Residing in the paraplegic ward of a veteran's hospital and embittered by his condition, he refuses to see his fiancée and sinks into a solitary world of hatred and hostility. Head physician, Dr. Brock cajoles the withdrawn Ken into the life of the ward, where fellow patients Norm, Leo and Angel begin to pull him out of his spiritual dilemma.
The lives of Ted and Marion Cole are thrown into disarray when their two adolescent sons die in a car wreck. Marion withdraws from Ted and Ruth, the couple's daughter. Ted, a well-known writer, hires as his assistant a student named Eddie, who looks oddly similar to one of the Coles' dead sons. The couple separate, and Marion begins an affair with Eddie, while Ted has a dalliance with his neighbor Evelyn.
Magdalena and Michael have loved each other since they were children. But when the Nazis come to power, Michael rebels against the regime and is sentenced to fifteen years in a concentration camp. Magdalena, meanwhile, goes underground with the help of a friend and later immigrates to the Soviet Union. Michael, who has joined the Red Army, discovers on the way to Moscow that Magdalena is staying there. But when his plane lands, she is already on her way back to Germany. Michael hopes that one day, he and Magdalena will be reunited.
A love story about chance meetings, instant attractions, and casual betrayals. Four strangers - with one thing in common: each other.
Kafka, an insurance worker gets embroiled in an underground group after a co-worker is murdered. The underground group is responsible for bombings all over town, attempting to thwart a secret organization that controls the major events in society. He eventually penetrates the secret organization and must confront them.
Humiliated and down on his luck, a superintendent turns his life around when he decides to write a book.
Genius artist Cesar Catilina seeks to leap the City of New Rome into a utopian, idealistic future, while his opposition, Mayor Franklyn Cicero, remains committed to a regressive status quo, perpetuating greed, special interests, and partisan warfare. Torn between them is socialite Julia Cicero, the mayor’s daughter, whose love for Cesar has divided her loyalties, forcing her to discover what she truly believes humanity deserves.
Blank-faced bug killer Bill Lee and his dead-eyed wife, Joan, like to get high on Bill's pest poisons while lounging with Beat poet pals. After meeting the devilish Dr. Benway, Bill gets a drug made from a centipede. Upon indulging, he accidentally kills Joan, takes orders from his typewriter-turned-cockroach, ends up in a constantly mutating Mediterranean city and learns that his hip friends have published his work -- which he doesn't remember writing.
George, host of a television show focusing on literature, receives videos shot on the sly that feature his family, along with disturbing drawings that are difficult to interpret. He has no idea who has made and sent him the videos. Progressively, the contents of the videos become more personal, indicating that the sender has known George for a long time.
A writer tries unsuccessfully to sell his screenplays and plays. He marries a television editor, but she only wants to fuck him and thinks nothing of his work. He then remembers his old Parisian lover Rita, calls himself Rita from then on and becomes her wife. When a French director stages a play of his, he meets Rita again in Paris and the two women become a happy couple.
During the final weeks of a presidential race, the President is accused of sexual misconduct. To distract the public until the election, the President's adviser hires a Hollywood producer to help him stage a fake war.
A love triangle forms between post-Enlightenment writer Friedrich Schiller and two sisters -- one who became his wife, and the other, his biographer.
Today, after not seeing his beloved Zulen in years, Dora comes face to face with him.
Holly Golightly is an eccentric New York City playgirl determined to marry a Brazilian millionaire. But when young writer Paul Varjak moves into her apartment building, her past threatens to get in their way.
Nathan Algren is an American hired to instruct the Japanese army in the ways of modern warfare, which finds him learning to respect the samurai and the honorable principles that rule them. Pressed to destroy the samurai's way of life in the name of modernization and open trade, Algren decides to become an ultimate warrior himself and to fight for their right to exist.
Oskar Matzerath is a very unusual boy. Refusing to leave the womb until promised a tin drum by his mother, Agnes, Oskar is reluctant to enter a world he sees as filled with hypocrisy and injustice, and vows on his third birthday to never grow up. Miraculously, he gets his wish. As the Nazis rise to power in Danzig, Oskar wills himself to remain a child, beating his tin drum incessantly and screaming in protest at the chaos surrounding him.
Manhattan explores how the life of a middle-aged television writer dating a teenage girl is further complicated when he falls in love with his best friend's mistress.
Murderesses Velma Kelly and Roxie Hart find themselves on death row together and fight for the fame that will keep them from the gallows in 1920s Chicago.
A young British soldier must find his way back to safety after his unit accidentally abandons him during a riot in the streets of Belfast.