A remarkable approach to Goethe's novel "The Sorrows of Young Werther": on the one hand, a film adaptation that strives to remain faithful to the work and its words; on the other hand, an examination of Goethe's authentic story, his experiences that inspired his writing, and his retrospective comments as an old man. The dialectical connection between these two models brings to life experiences of love, loneliness, and deadly despair, leading in one case to desperate suicide and in the other to poetic processing.