绰号“哭泣宝贝”的维德•沃克（Johnny Depp 约翰尼•德普 饰）流下的眼泪具有慰籍心灵的功效，这个一文不名的年轻人每天和好友们过着虽不富裕却欢乐常在的生活。不过在那些好好少年看来，维德他们不过是一群打架斗殴、惹是生非的阿飞。 某天，维德结识了乖乖女艾丽逊（Amy Locane 艾米•洛肯 饰），两人共坠爱河，这令倾慕艾丽逊的那群“品学兼优”的好学生们的嫉妒和憎恨。他们结伴向维德一派发起攻击，两个相爱之人就这样一次次被迫卷入纷争之中。他们的爱情能否经受这些磨难的考验？

Released in France as La Kermesse Heroique, Carnival in Flanders is set during the long-ago war between the Dutch and Spanish. A tiny village in Flanders is invaded by Spanish troops. The townsfolk have heard of Spanish cruelties in other towns, and decide to deflect the vanquishers by playing dead. This isn't terribly effective (you have to take a breath once in a while), so the wife of the burgomaster tries to soften up the invaders with a lavish carnival. So successful is this venture that the Spaniards allow the village to escape being decimated, or even taxed. An award-winner many times over, Carnival in Flanders was banned in Germany; evidently, Goebbels caught on that director Jacques Feyder and scenarists Bernard Zimmer and Charles Spaak were drawing deliberate parallels between the Spanish and the then-burgeoning Nazis.

影片讲的是，忠厚本分的年轻人皮特是个泥瓦匠，他十分孝顺父母，还亲自为他们造了一所房子。然而父母对他的态度似乎并没有因此而好转。之后，他遇上了心爱的女人艾瑞卡。他们一起搬到了慕尼黑，然而，生活的重压，金钱上的困窘却让皮特这个年轻人渐渐改变，最终沦为了阶下囚，而这一切只是为了让妻子爱他…… 该片被一些评论家认为是莱纳尔·沃纳尔·法斯宾德的最佳电影代表作。