A 5-year-old boy with a unique way of seeing the world feels alienated from his mother and tells her that he does not need her anymore. This viewpoint later causes him to lash out at his family, leading him to reflect on himself and his life.

After a young Jewish boy moves to Berlin with his family, he learns that his family agreed to watch a boy from the mental institution on the weekends. The two become friends, and the boy learns more about himself through meeting the other boy.

A son tells a series of stories, most of them about his father and stepfather. As the son describes a robbery that took place at his house in high school and his experiences with his father, a former Jehovah's Witness and current alcoholic, he begins to recall details from his childhood.

A young girl works to impress her highly critical parents and submits to a terrible fate as she struggles to meet their impossible standards.

A divorced 16 year old girl reflects on how the sexual trauma she experienced as a child perpetuates in her relationships with men throughout her life, forcing herself to grow up too early and leaving her starved for affection and love.

A girl going through puberty hopelessly tries to hold onto childhood during a day at the beach, but meddling mothers push her to grow up.

After a ten-year-old boy joins his parents in bidding his grandfather farewell as he leaves New York for Germany, he experiences the first major loss of his youth and struggles to understand the complexity of the experience.

On a weekend trip to their lakeside cottage, two anxious parents watch as their young son experiences nature and takes a small first step onto the long path of growing up.

An afternoon at the park takes an unexpected turn for a mother and her son as the well-established families that they admire turn out to be unhappy people who secretly enjoy the misery of others. As the day progresses, the mother is surprised to learn that she and her son share many negative qualities with those families.

A woman examines a period of time in her childhood spent with her sister and the babysitter's son, viewing it through the lens of an adult, and ponders how the experience might have shaped her as a person.