Plot

In 1945, Germany is being overrun, and nobody is left to fight but teenagers.

A group of German boys is ordered to protect a small bridge in their home village during the waning months of the second world war. Truckloads of defeated, cynical Wehrmacht soldiers flee the approaching American troops, but the boys, full of enthusiasm for the "blood and honor" Nazi ideology, stay to defend the useless bridge.—Miranda Callahan

A couple of days before the end of World War II, seven sixteen year-old German boys from a small village are recruited for military service. The idealistic Hans Scholten, Albert Mutz, Walter Forst, Jurgen Borchert, Karl Horber, Klaus Hager and Sigi Bernhard join the army on 26 April 1945, with great expectations and enthusiasm to defend their motherland Germany in the front against the will of their parents. Their English teacher, Stern, unsuccessfully tries to convince Commander Fröhlich to refuse the enlistment of the youngsters. After one day's training, the soldiers are summoned to the front, but the Commander of the 463rd Battalion of the 3rd Company assigns Sergeant Heilmann to stay with the rookies "protecting" a useless bridge in their village in order to spare the boys.—Claudio Carvalho, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

April 1945 in a small German town, shortly before the end of the Second World War: Seven adolescent boys enjoy a relatively normal everyday life in the last days of the war: They go to school, weave their first tender bonds and meet at their favorite spot by the river. On the evening of a carefree day, the conscription order is suddenly on the table for all of them. In just one afternoon they are prepared for their deployment at the front, and already during the night there is an alarm: the Americans have broken through. Captain Fröhlich tries a trick to keep the children away from the front. He gives them the order to defend the small bridge in front of the town. Sergeant Heilmann is to make sure that nothing happens to them. But Heilmann is mistaken for a deserter during a reconnaissance mission in the village and is shot. The boys at the bridge have nothing to hold on to - except their mission, their "orders". Fanatically, they throw themselves at the approaching American tanks. Five of the boys die, only Mutz and Scholten survive the fighting. As the Americans turn away to get reinforcements, a German demolition squad appears to blow up the strategically unimportant bridge. Stunned by the senseless deaths of his comrades, Mutz shoots down one of the demolition squad. The soldiers shoot back and fatally shoot Scholten. Mutz staggers back into the city.