Legendary South Tyrolean mountain climber and director Luis Trenker offers Eva Braun's diaries to Hollywood agent Paul Kohner at the Venice Film Festival in 1948. Film director Leni Riefenstahl sues to have the authenticity of the diaries verified because they claim she was once Hitler's mistress. The story of these two famous opportunists is told in flashbacks, from their brief romance to their ruthless competitive bouts to their backing by Hitler and Goebbels and their artistic successes.