Lau Lauritzen Jr.

The attic of a city house is the home to a colony of artists. Among them is a writer, whose corpus is larger than her output. We also meet a hard-of-hearing poet who can still hear the grass growing. There's a painter, a sculptor and more. All are penniless - hoping that one day they will experience their breakthrough. "The Seventh Heaven", as the corridor is called, also houses two prominent residents, Fyrtårnet and Bivognen. They have set up a small diner and engage lively with the artist from the colony.

Sigurd, the son of a hard-hearted, feared and hated consul, cannot have the girl he loves - because her mother is a Lapp girl - so he goes as a stowaway on "Vesle Kari" to the west ice of Greenland. Here the ship sinks, and only Sigurd and another young man, Lorens, make it ashore. The two eventually get on each other's nerves so much in the desolate north that Sigurd kills Lorens in self-defense.

The strict customs regulations have brought about a special type of lawbreaker - smugglers! They abound in all countries, and even in our relatively peaceful country, there are more of them than one would think. The great film director Stenbuk reads sensational articles about a major smuggling affair, and he sends a manuscript back to two writers with the message that if they do not come up with a smuggling-themed manuscript within eight days, they can run and chicken.

On the 9th of April 1940, the crew of a Danish merchant ship receives the news of Germany's invasion of Denmark. Instead of returning home, they vote in favor of setting course for England. The crew will undergo much hardship over the next five years ...

Frederik Larsen (Lau Lauritzen Jr.), a sailor and has sailed since he was 15. Now he has lost the desire for a sailor life, especially after his best friend Bob was lost in a hurricane. When his ship docks at Copenhagen, shortly before Christmas, he signs off with all his hire on the pocket. He seeks accommodations in sailor home Bertel, located on the nice side of Nyhavn. Here he can stay and eat for very little money. He delivers his kitbag to the concierge Henrik (Mogens Hermansen) before he was lured by accordion music and the laughter that comes to him from the "naughty" side of Nyhavn. In the Cafe "The black sails", he accidently joins Inger (Lisbeth Movin) at the same table, whose profession is not in the phone book, although it is the world's oldest. Inger is in the company of an unemployed stoker Vladimir W. Olsen (Poul Reichhardt) that is full of scams, and has a good mood.

The owner of Rønneby Kro, Bartholdi, is writing his memoirs. When this comes to the ears of prominent citizens, they rush to Rønneby Kro to have the publication stopped. However, Bartholdi is neither a stickler nor a hack. They get help from a lawyer, who only has success when he goes through Bartholdi's grandson.

Jacob and Else Svendsen are a happily married couple. He is a taxi driver and experiences the small and big events of the big city in a way that only a man behind the wheel of a taxi with the whole city as his workplace can. But a shadow hangs over their marriage – a shadow from the past. Else was married once before, but had to divorce because her former husband, Eigil Rasmussen, suffered from pathological jealousy.