Plot

In WWII's final years, a soldier in the German army, a British glider pilot, and a Dutch resistance fighter's paths intertwine. Their choices shape destinies, impacting not only their freedom but also that of others.

Three young lives become inextricably connected in the final years of World War II, as thousands of Allied soldiers battle the German army. A Dutch boy fighting for the Germans, an English glider pilot, and a Dutch resistance fighter connected to the resistance against her will, are forced to make crucial choices that impact both their own freedom and the freedom of others.—grantss

Zeeland is under German occupation in September 1944 following the Normandy landings in June 1944. After 2 months of intense fighting, Germany has retreated. But Allies need a port to provide supplies to their troops. Antwerp is liberated but cannot be reached as Holland is still in German control and blocks the allied passage to Antwerp. Part of the German army has retreated across the Scheldt river to the Island of Holland. Holland needs to be liberated, if Antwerp needs to be reached by sea.

Teuntje Visser (Susan Radder) works in the office of the collaborationist mayor. While she and her father (a medical doctor) (Jan Bijvoet) initially manage to avoid choosing sides (The father treats both Germans and Zeelanders), her younger brother Dirk (Ronald Kalter) is a member of the Dutch Resistance.

Dirk is arrested for attacking a passing German convoy. Dirk was photographing the convoy, when a German soldier forcibly took the camera from him and destroyed it, prompting Dirk to pick a rock and throw it at a truck, hurting the driver and causing a accident where the truck hits another German soldier. Dirk manages to reach home later that night where Teuntje sews up a surface wound that Dirk endured during his escape. But the next day, the German army starts arresting innocent Dutch buys and young adults and threatens to execute them until the real perpetrator surrenders. One of the Dutch betrays Dirk to Oberst Berghof and he is eventually arrested from his home.

Dirk is tortured into revealing the names of other Resistance members. Dirk was left with little choice as the Germans arrested innocent boys from the Island and threatened to kill them in cold blood, until Dirk revealed the names. Meanwhile the allied forces are planning an massive air operation in Holland. This involves 35000 men bring air dropped 65 miles behind enemy lines in Holland, using aircraft and gliders.

Meanwhile, Marinus Van Staveren (Gijs Blom), a Dutch volunteer in the Waffen-SS Division Das Reich, is reassigned from the Eastern Front (where he has faced the US army and moderately injured during the fighting) to serve as a secretary and translator for the German commandant in Zeeland, Oberst Berghof (Justus Von Dohnanyi). Marinus had seen the brutality of war on the Eastern front and lost his friends and colleagues to American bullets. While recovering at the field hospital, he witnesses scores of German soldiers who lost their limbs to the fighting.

Marinus grows increasingly disillusioned with the Nazis' heavy-handed tactics including the execution of civilian hostages. He sympathizes with Teuntje and her father as they attempt to negotiate a lighter sentence for Dirk in Berghof's office. Despite initial assurances that Dirk will be treated leniently, Berghof ultimately orders that Dirk be executed along with the other Resistance members without exception. Marinus tries to pass the news secretly to Teuntje but is spotted by a German officer who reports him to Berghof. As punishment, he is selected to be part of the firing squad lineup for Dirk's execution and sent back to combat duty.

After Dirk's death, Teuntje is drawn into the Resistance. Teuntje learns that Dirk had been covertly photographing German artillery positions along the Scheldt River. Teuntje and her best friend, a Resistance member named Janna (Marthe Schneider), are tasked with smuggling Dirk's photographs to the Allied forces advancing on Walcheren Island. The Germans have taken defensive positions around the only entry point to the Island, and the maps and the photos show an alternate route, through the Scheldt River, that will allow the Allies to attack the Germans from behind.

Elsewhere, Glider Pilot Regiment glider pilot Sergeant Will Sinclair (Jamie Flatters), Captain Tony Turner (Tom Felton), and Staff Sergeant MacKay (Gordon Morris) are separated from their comrades after their Airspeed Horsa glider is hit by anti-aircraft fire and crash-lands in a flooded estuary in Zeeland during Operation Market Garden. Turner is wounded during the crash-landing.

Operation Market Garden was an Allied military operation during the Second World War fought in the German-occupied Netherlands from 17 to 25 September 1944. Its objective was to create a 64 miles (103 Km) salient into German territory with a bridgehead over the Nederrijn (Lower Rhine River), creating an Allied invasion route into northern Germany. This was to be achieved by two sub-operations: seizing nine bridges with combined American and British airborne forces ("Market") followed by British land forces swiftly following over the bridges ("Garden").

After wading through the marshes, they stop at a farmhouse where they meet a Dutch farmer who informs them that Operation Market Garden was a failure and that the Canadian Army have crossed the Belgian border and entered Holland. They decided to head for the Canadian lines and halfway on their journey they take shelter in a house but are attacked by German soldiers. Turner is killed in the altercation. The British Airborne Soldiers (Sinclair and Mackay) later join Canadian Army forces advancing on Walcheren Island.

Prior to the Battle of Walcheren Causeway, Teuntje is captured while helping Janna escape with the photographs on a boat. Janna is shot and wounded but makes it to the Allied lines before dying . Marinus takes part in the German defense of Walcheren Island while Sinclair participates in the Allied assault. The Allies first attack upfront, sustaining heavy casualties, before the map provided by a dying Jenna allows the troops to cross the water and attack from the side, overriding the Germans. During the battle, Sinclair and Marinus cross paths and hold each other at gunpoint, but the two men decide to let each other go.

Near the end of the battle, Marinus kills a German soldier attempting to execute Teuntje. Marinus is shot during the struggle. A grateful Teuntje tends to him, but Marinus dies of his injuries. Sinclair and other Allied soldiers find Teuntje next to Marinus' body. Teuntje walks away as the town is liberated.

The Allied victory at Walcheren Causeway opened to Allied forces a sea route to the port of Antwerp and helped contribute to the Allied liberation of the Netherlands on 5 May 1945. 3231 Allies, 4250 Germans and 2283 civilian lives were lost in the liberation of this Island.