A young boy becomes callous to the deaths and battles that rage on during World War II. He and his friends follow a peasant soldier of a Rumanian troop as they march to join the Russians in fighting the Nazis. He watches as one of his friends dies after destroying a German machine gun nest. He is slapped by a Rumanian soldier who is livid over the boy's nonchalance of his friend's death. He becomes a mascot of the advancing unit as they proceed to a castle in Czechoslovakia. When the men dress in armor for a group picture, they are killed by the Nazis. The boy returns to find the men have been wiped out and he is taken prisoner by a German soldier. The Nazi falls victim to marauding peasants seeking revenge. They rescue the young warrior and escort him back to his home in Rumania.

Escaping from a totalitarian society, in which music is banned, is rendered impossible, and the violent death of the artists, imposed by the supreme ruler, is carried out with no hesitation by his obedient servants.