A cinematographic essay, without dialogues, about the months Friedrich Nietzsche spent in Turin, Italy, with narration quoted by his original writings. It was there that the philosopher wrote some of his most known books such as Ecce Homo and Twilight of the Idols.

During an expedition into Central Africa, paleontologist Dr. Susan Matthews-Loomis and her husband George Loomis attempt to track down evidence of a local monster legend. The monster, which the local natives refer to as " Mokele-mbembe ", shares many characteristics with the Sauropod order of dinosaurs. During the expedition, they discover brontosaurus in the deep jungle and are further amazed when the animals show very little fear of them. The couple begins observing the creatures and become especially enamored with the curious young offspring of the pair, whom they nickname "Baby". Unfortunately, the discovery soon places the dinosaurs in jeopardy from both the local military as well as fellow scientist Dr. Eric Kiviat. Whereas Dr. Kiviat sees Baby and his parents as his ticket to fame and fortune, the African military led by Colonel Nsogbu sees the dinosaurs as a threat and makes several attempts to destroy them. During one such attempt, the adult male brontosaurus is killed and the adult female captured. The Loomises are able to escape with Baby, but quickly find themselves lost in the jungle while being pursued by Colonel Nsogbu's forces. After finally escaping their pursuers, the pair decide to circle back and rescue the female adult brontosaurus, whom Dr. Kiviat has persuaded Colonel Nsogbu to transport back to civilization. With the aid of the local tribe – who see Baby and his parents as legends – George and Susan are able to break into the military compound and release the mother brontosaurus. During the escape, both Kiviat and Nsogbu are killed. Afterwards, the Loomises take the pair to a secluded jungle lagoon and say a tearful goodbye to Baby as he follows his mother away into the deeper parts of the jungle.

The film is divided into three parts from the point of view of the main characters.

In 1918, a man named Burt Berendsen is sent by his estranged wife's parents to fight in World War I. While stationed in France, Burt befriends African-American soldier Harold Woodman. After sustaining injuries in battle, Burt and Harold are nursed back to health by nurse Valerie Bandenberg. After the end of the war, the three live together in Amsterdam. Burt returns to New York City to be with his wife. Harold begins a romantic relationship with Valerie. Valerie, however, eventually abandons Harold, who also returns to New York. Fifteen years later, Burt has opened his medical practice treating veterans of the war. Harold is now a lawyer, and they have not heard from Valerie since they left Amsterdam. Harold asks Burt to perform an autopsy on Bill Meekins (a senator who served as the commander of their regiment during the war) at the behest of Meekins's daughter Elizabeth, who believes that he was murdered during his recent trip to Europe. Aided by medical examiner Irma St. Clair, Burt performs the autopsy, which reveals poison in Meekins's stomach. Burt and Harold meet with Elizabeth to talk about the autopsy results, but she is soon killed when a hitman pushes her into traffic. The hitman frames Burt and Harold for her death, and they flee as the police arrive. Burt and Harold try to find out who told Elizabeth to hire them. This leads them to wealthy textile heir Tom Voze, his patronizing wife Libby, and Tom's sister Valerie (whose real surname is Voze). Valerie had persuaded Elizabeth to hire them, knowing that they were trustworthy. Valerie is under constant supervision by Tom and Libby, who claim that she suffers from a nerve disease and epilepsy. They were actually poisoning Valerie to keep her compliant. Burt and Harold talk with Tom, who suggests that they talk to General Gil Dillenbeck, a notable veteran who is friends with Meekins, to learn who accompanied Meekins on the trip (and might have poisoned him or be able to lead them to the person who did). While Burt attempts to contact the general, Irma visits him at his medical practice. She says that she was attacked and her wrist broken while trying to bring him the autopsy report, and the attacker took the paper from her. After resetting her wrist, Burt kisses Irma. Meanwhile, Harold and Valerie notice that the hitman, Tarim Milfax, has been watching the house. They follow him to a forced sterilization clinic owned by an organization known as the "Committee of the Five". After a fight with Milfax, Harold and Valerie reunite with Burt. Valerie takes them to the Waldorf Astoria New York. There, they meet Paul Canterbury and Henry Norcross, Valerie's benefactors from Amsterdam. They are secretly spies in the intelligence community. The Committee of the Five is a cabal in the US with ties to Germany and plans to overthrow the American government. Dillenbeck can help foil their plot. The trio meets with Dillenbeck, who is offered a large sum of money from a man on behalf of an unnamed benefactor to deliver a speech advocating for veterans to forcibly remove U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt and install Dillenbeck as a puppet dictator instead. Dillenbeck agrees to help the trio foil the plot and to speak at a veterans reunion gala that Burt and Harold are hosting to draw out whoever is behind the plot. At the gala, Tom introduces Dillenbeck to the industrial leaders Nevins, Belport and Jeffers. Burt realises that they actually want Dillenbeck to become the fifth member of their cabal. Dillenbeck reads his speech instead of the one he was paid to read. Milfax tries to shoot him, but Harold, Valerie, and Burt stop him in time. Milfax is arrested and the Committee of the Five is revealed to be four industry leaders, including Tom. They intended to turn the United States into a fascist country. Tom and the other leaders are arrested by the police, but do not stay in jail long, and expose Dillenbeck in the press following their release. Dillenbeck testifies about the incident to Congress. Harold and Valerie leave the country since they cannot be together in the United States. Burt wishes them farewell, planning to reopen his medical practice and pursue a relationship with Irma.

After the town of Kaihoro's entire population disappear, the Astro Investigation and Defence Service (AIDS) sends their agents Derek, Frank, Ozzy, and Barry to investigate. They find the town overrun by man-eating aliens disguised as humans in blue shirts. Barry kills one of the aliens and is attacked by others. After Derek notifies Frank and Ozzy, he begins torturing Robert, an alien they caught earlier. Robert's screaming attracts a number of aliens. Derek kills the would-be rescuers, but he is attacked by Robert and falls off a cliff ledge, to his presumed death. Meanwhile, charity collector Giles passes through Kaihoro. He escapes Robert's attack and comes to nearby house for help, only to get captured by another alien. Giles later wakes up in a tub of water filled with vegetables and is told he is about to be cooked and eaten. Derek wakes up in a seagull 's nest with a hole in his head, so he uses a hat to keep his brains from leaking out. That night, Frank, Ozzy, and Barry infiltrate the aliens' house and find a room filled with bloody cardboard boxes, likely containing the corpses of former Kaihoro residents. They kill an alien, and Frank wears its shirt to infiltrate their meeting. He learns that the victims have been harvested for food and hears of their recent hostage, Giles. The alien later dines on Robert's vomit, and the disguised (and disgusted) Frank has to follow suit. He escapes and tells the others of the plan. They save Giles as the aliens sleep. At sunrise, they try to leave but are attacked by the aliens, and a gunfight ensues. Derek emerges and joins the fight, using his belt as a headband when the hat is shot off. He grabs a chainsaw from the boot of his car and heads for the aliens' house. As the group leaves with Giles, the alien leader (Lord Crumb) and his followers morph into their true form and follow. Ozzy uses a rocket launcher to explode Frank's car, which has been overrun by aliens. Frank and Ozzy hunt for Lord Crumb and kill many aliens along the way. Meanwhile, Derek kills an alien with his chainsaw and replaces the missing parts of his brain with its brain. An alien prepares to shoot Frank and Ozzy, but it is beheaded by Derek. Frank and Ozzy are shocked to see him alive, and see he has lost his mind. After they escape the house, Lord Crumb shoots Ozzy in the leg and Frank fires his rocket launcher at the leader, but misses. Lord Crumb knocks out Derek and the house transforms into a giant spaceship and blasts off into space. On board, Derek looks out the window to see Earth. He ambushes Crumb and kills the alien with his chainsaw. He proclaims war on the alien, then puts on the alien leader's skin and laughs maniacally as he rockets towards the alien planet. Back on Earth, the survivors drive away in Derek's car.

In 1987, two university students in an unnamed Romanian town, Otilia Mihărtescu and Gabriela "Găbița" Drăguț, are roommates in a dormitory. When Găbița becomes pregnant, the two young women arrange a meeting with Mr. Bebe in a hotel, where he is to perform an illegal abortion. At the college dorm, Găbița and Otilia review the items they need for the day. As Găbița nervously sits and waits, Otilia bargains and buys soap and cigarettes from the dormitory shop. Afterwards, Otilia takes a bus to visit her boyfriend Adi, from whom she borrows money. Adi asks Otilia to visit his family that night, as it is his mother's birthday. Otilia initially declines but relents after Adi becomes upset. Otilia heads to the Unirea hotel, where Găbița has booked a room, only to be informed by an unfriendly receptionist that there is no reservation under Găbița's last name. Otilia visits another hotel, the Tineretului, and after much begging and haggling, is able to book a room at an expensive rate. After speaking with Găbița on the telephone, Otilia goes to a rendezvous point to meet with Bebe, although he had asked Găbița to meet him personally. Mr. Bebe grows angry upon hearing that Găbița is not at the planned hotel. At the Tineretului, Bebe discovers that Găbița's claim that her pregnancy was in its second or third month was a lie, and that it has been at least four months. This changes the procedure and also adds the risk of a murder charge. While the two women were certain that they would pay no more than 3,000 lei for the abortion, it slowly becomes clear that Bebe expects both women to have sex with him. Desperate and distressed, Otilia has sex with Bebe, as does Găbița. Bebe then performs the abortion by injecting a probe and an unnamed fluid into Găbița's uterus and leaves Otilia instructions on how to dispose of the fetus when it comes out. Otilia is exasperated by Găbița's lies but continues to help and care for her. Otilia leaves Găbița at the Tineretului to attend Adi's mother's birthday party. She is still disturbed but stays and has dinner with Adi's mother's friends, who are mostly doctors. They converse about trivial matters while Otilia and Adi remain silent. After Otilia accepts a cigarette in front of Adi's parents, one of the guests starts talking about lost values and respect for elders. Adi and Otilia retreat to his room, where she tells him about Găbița's abortion. They begin debating what would happen if it were Otilia who was pregnant, as Adi is opposed to abortion. After the argument, Otilia calls Găbița from Adi's house. Găbița does not answer, so Otilia decides to return to the hotel. When Otilia enters the hotel room, Găbița is lying on the bed, and she tells Otilia that the fetus has been expelled and is in the bathroom. Otilia wraps the fetus with some towels and puts it in a bag, while Găbița asks her to bury it. Otilia walks outside, finally climbing to the top of a building, as Mr. Bebe had suggested, and drops the bag in a trash chute. She returns to the Tineretului and finds Găbița sitting in its restaurant. Otilia sits and tells Găbița that they are never going to talk about the episode again. Otilia stares blankly at Găbița.

London gangster George Thomason and his right-hand man, Ken Pile, an animal lover with a stutter, plan a jewel heist. They bring in two Americans: con artist Wanda Gershwitz and weapons expert Otto West, a mean-spirited Anglophobe. Wanda and Otto are lovers, but they hide this from George and Ken, pretending to be siblings, so Wanda can work her charms on them. The heist is successful, and the gang escapes with a large sum in diamonds that they hide in a safe in an old workshop. Soon after, Wanda and Otto betray George to the police, and he is arrested. They return to collect the diamonds, with Wanda planning to double-cross Otto as well, but find that George has moved them. In Ken's fish tank, Wanda discovers the key to the safe deposit box containing the diamonds and hides it in her pendant. Wanda decides to seduce George's barrister, Archie Leach, so he can persuade George to plead guilty and give up the location of the diamonds. Archie is in a loveless marriage and falls for Wanda; Otto is jealous, and his interference causes Wanda and Archie's liaisons to go disastrously wrong. Wanda accidentally leaves her pendant at Archie's house, and Archie's wife, Wendy, mistakes it as a gift for her. At Wanda's insistence, Archie recovers the pendant by staging a burglary. Eventually, Archie, feeling guilty, ends the affair. George asks Ken to kill Mrs Coady, the Crown 's only eyewitness. To his dismay, Ken accidentally kills her three dogs by means of a series of staged accidents, but ultimately succeeds in his aim when she dies of a heart attack. Wanda and Otto want George to remain in jail, but with no witness, he seems set to get off. At his trial, defence witness Wanda unexpectedly gives evidence against him. When Archie, stunned, flubs his cross-examination and calls her "darling", Wendy realises that Archie has had an affair and decides to divorce him. Otto tries to force Ken to reveal the location of the diamonds by eating his pet fish, leaving Ken's favourite, named Wanda, until last. Ken reveals that the diamonds are at a hotel near Heathrow Airport. With his career and marriage over, Archie resolves to cut his losses, steal the loot, and flee to South America. Promised less jail time, George tells Archie that Ken knows where the diamonds are. Archie sees Wanda fleeing the courthouse, pulls her into his car, and races to Ken's flat. As Archie runs into the building, Otto steals his car, taking Wanda with him. Ken and Archie give chase. Otto and Wanda recover the diamonds, but Wanda double-crosses him and leaves him unconscious in a broom cupboard. Recovering, Otto shoots his way out of the cupboard and is confronted by Archie. Otto is about to kill him, but Archie stalls him by taunting Otto about American failures such as the Vietnam War. Ken arrives driving a steamroller, seeking vengeance for the fish; Otto, who has stepped in wet concrete and cannot move, is run over but survives. Archie and Wanda board the plane, and Otto, clinging to the window outside, curses them until he is blown off during takeoff.