Sonny Boy

A young man from Suriname named Waldemar Nods travels to the Netherlands to pursue studies. His dark skin immediately marks him and invites discrimination. He moves to lodgings in The Hague with Rika van der Lans.

Rika leaves her deeply religious husband Willem after discovering his affair with the maid Jans and takes their four children with her. She begins a relationship with Waldemar. She becomes pregnant but keeps it secret for a time. Waldemar becomes involved as the father.

Rika becomes pregnant after starting the relationship. She privately considers an abortion with the help of a woman, but changes her mind. When she is four months pregnant she tells Waldemar, who is angry for not being told earlier. He leaves.

Waldemar returns after learning about the pregnancy and is angry for not being told earlier, so he leaves. He also obtains a court order for Bertha and Henk to live with him. He refuses a divorce, blocking Rika from marrying Waldemar.

When the child is born they call him Waldy, nicknamed Sonny Boy. Rika and Waldemar's relationship continues amid the strain of their circumstances. The boy's birth anchors their precarious life.

Rika's landlord terminates the rental because of the extramarital affair with a dark-skinned Surinamese. Rika and Waldemar roam the streets with Waldy until they meet Sam, an older Jewish man who rents them a room. Sam offers support and helps them move toward a more stable living arrangement.

With Sam's financial help, Rika and Waldemar open a guesthouse in Scheveningen. The venture provides a stable home and a foothold during precarious times. They settle into a coastal life as war looms.

During the German invasion of the Netherlands, Waldemar and Rika are forced to shelter German soldiers. As the war progresses, the area is evacuated to make way for the Atlantikwall defense system.

Rika, now mother of five, is allotted a larger replacement house. At the request of resistance fighter Kees Chardon, she begins hiding people in their home. She chooses to hide Jewish people because the fees are higher, and an SS deserter also hides there.

A raid reveals the hidden people, and Waldemar, Rika, and Waldy are arrested. Waldy is released to relatives and later placed with a foster family.

Waldy is placed with a farmer. During the winter hunger, he prevents a couple from selling their wedding rings by offering his parents' rings. The farmer notes that wartime desperation drives people to desperate acts, including the hiding of families for money.

Waldemar is shipped to Neuengamme concentration camp, but his language skills land him in the mailroom. This position gives him a chance to secretly send letters to Waldy.

After Hitler's death, Waldemar is deported to the Cap Arcona, a ship bombed by British fighters. He jumps into the sea and manages to swim to the shore, but is killed by two German child soldiers.

Sometime after the war, Marcel and Bertha arrive at a train station and meet Waldy, then take him to live with his maternal grandparents. He receives a letter from his mother wishing him luck and expressing hope to visit her husband.

End credits reveal that Rika died at Ravensbrück in 1945 after an epidemic of dysentery. Sixty years later, in 2004, Waldy learns the truth about his parents' deaths.