1990
A small suburban town receives a visit from a castaway unfinished science experiment named Edward.
1953
1997
The sick King Jorgen worries about the marriage of his daughter Elena. The fairytale-like, dramatic confusion triggers a shimmering golden fire bird with its wondrous song every full moon night - it makes the king heal and brings the "good" prince as husband of the "good" Princess Elena.
1982
The merchant's daughter Constanze, begs her father to ask a lion for a favor. Her father approaches the lion who agrees to his request with one condition: that he send the first person he meets upon his return home to the lion's den. It is Constanze. Against her father's will she goes to the lion and discovers that he is an enchanged prince and that only a woman's love can release him from the spell.
12-year-old Jakob helps out at his mother's vegetable stand and also carries customers' purchased goods home. One day, an old woman with a long nose comes to the stand and claims that the herbs are bad and were better 50 years ago. Jakob is upset that she holds all the herbs to her nose and crushes them: "Take it away from your long nose!" he shouts and hits her hand. "Don't you like it, my beautiful long nose?" the woman scoffs, "You should have one too, even longer than mine." Finally, she buys some cabbages, which she wants Jakob to carry home for her. Jakob resists but is persuaded by his mother. Other market women whisper whether the old woman is not the evil fairy Kräuterweis.
1984
A bored prince realizes he would like a wife. His mother searches through all the kingdoms far and wide for a "suitable" princess. In the meantime, a charming and witty young lady, who claims to be a princess, shows up at the castle doorstep with a sprained ankle and is shown hospitality by the prince and his best friend the Fool.
2020
Amalindis, the first-born of the two royal twins, is dutiful and agrees to marry Prince Tanka. Zottelhaube, on the other hand, the second-born, does not feel connected to her nobility, but to the great outdoors and a wolf - and lives in the forest. Suddenly, three witches kidnap Amalindis, as the first-born can be a witch herself. The witches see this as a prerequisite for the eldest of them being able to rejuvenate herself in order to survive: she will slip into the body of Amalindis for the next solar eclipse! "Zottel" suspects that time is running out before this transformation. Reluctant to go with Tanka, who is determined to accompany her, she sets off on the dangerous journey to rescue her sister. She has no idea that she, of all people, will fall in love in the process. And she has no idea that it will soon be in question who is actually the first-born and therefore the one with powerful witchy abilities.
Ronia lives happily in her father's castle until she comes across a new playmate, Birk, in the nearby dark forest. The two explore the wilderness, braving dangerous Witchbirds and Rump-Gnomes. But when their families find out Birk and Ronia have been playing together, they forbid them to see each other again. Indeed, their fathers are competing robber chieftains and bitter enemies. Now the two spunky children must try to tear down the barriers that have kept their families apart for so long.
