A transitional film at the end of his first decade of filmmaking, James Benning’s Grand Opera introduces a degree of storytelling to his previously more formalist devices. Benning calls the film his “first attempt at writing my own kind of history” and, in a sense, it also serves to write himself into history, acutely measuring his place as a Midwestern experimental filmmaker, then based in Oklahoma, in relationship to the avant-garde scene situated in New York. The film thus features homages to the prominent experimental cinema of the time, including a spoof of Wavelength, as well as cameos from Michael Snow, Hollis Frampton and Yvonne Rainer. Woven with these sequences are other characteristic Benning gambits – a compilation of every house he ever lived in, a preoccupation with the history of Pi, and the looming threat that a building will explode.

Luisa and Erika are prototypes of young women who plunge into relationships with the "wrong" men. Luisa wants to become an actress, which upsets her husband Igor to no end. Erika is trying to work as much as possible so that she can afford to study and thereby achieve a better outlook on life, but she unfortunately runs up against a boss who doesn't have the best intentions with her. Ultimately Luisa's husband demonstratively commits suicide. Erika accidentally kills her boss in self-defense... The women blame themselves for all these failures, and that has got to change. Both have to grow up and start living again. Perhaps even together.

The history, structures and rhythms of human history are seen through a glorious, massive pyramid.

A young opera singer is stalked by a deranged fan bent on killing the people associated with her to claim her for himself.

Love story between a young man and a married woman. She's married to a businessman who's neglecting her. She would like to leave him but she's afraid of the age difference between her and her lover.

Ksenia has ambition, lots of it. She wants to make it big in hospitality. Chasing her goal she comes to Moscow where she meets a new eccentric hotel owner of The Grand hotel. Not someone to let the truth stand in the way of an opportunity, Ksenia presents herself as a professional, ready for a management position. Her lies are caught out and she’s packed off to the rather unglamorous laundry to begin her career in hospitality. Will Ksenia be able to tame her adventurous nature and to fit into the tight-knit hotel team at The Grand? Or will she blow it?

In the piano-making town of Grand, Pennsylvania, Janice Pasetti keeps house for factory owner Harris Weldon, his newlywed niece and her husband, while raising her teenage daughter.