Part One: War
The hungover Blacky eats breakfast while Vera complains about his supposed affair with a theatre actress. After the roar of the planes is heard, German bombs begin falling on Belgrade. After the air raid is over, Blacky goes out against Vera's wishes and inspects the devastated city. Encountering ruins and escaped animals from the zoo, he also runs into disconsolate Ivan carrying Soni, a baby chimp. The Royal Yugoslav Army's resistance is broken, and German troops occupy and dismember the Kingdom. Blacky starts operating clandestinely as a communist activist along with Marko and others. Blacky occasionally visits his mistress Natalija Zovkov who has been assigned to a special actors' labour brigade that is helping the city's rebuilding effort under German occupation. A celebrated actress in the National Theatre, Natalija has caught the eye of Franz, a high-ranking German officer.
Marko has set up a weapons stash in the cellar of his grandfather's house. Following their interception of a trainload of weapons, Marko and Blacky are identified as dangerous bandits in German radio bulletins. While Blacky hides in the woods as Germans intensify door-to-door raids, Marko takes Vera, Ivan and others into the cellar to hide. Vera gives birth to a baby boy, who she names Jovan before dying.
In 1944, Blacky is in town to celebrate Jovan's birthday at a communist hangout. The two best friends head for the theatre and see Natalija performing on stage in front of Franz and other German officers. Blacky shoots Franz in the chest (he survives) and, along with Natalija and Marko, reaches the river boat anchored outside Belgrade. There, they all get ready for a forced wedding despite Natalija's protestations.
The party is interrupted by German soldiers surrounding the boat. Franz yells, demanding Blacky and Marko release Natalija, who runs to him. Blacky is captured by Germans and tortured in a hospital with electric shocks while Franz and Natalija visit her brother Bata there. Meanwhile, Marko finds a way to enter the building through an underground sewer passage. Sneaking up on Franz, Marko strangles him to death with a cord in front of Natalija who switches sides once again. Marko then proceeds to free Blacky. They leave with a fatigued Blacky hidden in a suitcase, but he is injured by a grenade.
Days later on Easter 1944, Marko and Natalija, now a couple, watch a comatose Blacky. In late October, the Red Army accompanied by Yugoslav Partisans enters Belgrade. Marko gives speeches from the National Theater balcony during the Trieste crisis, socializes with Josip Broz Tito, Aleksandar Ranković and Edvard Kardelj, and stands next to Tito during military parades through downtown Belgrade.
