[3] In 1963, Nelson Mandela's inner circle of Black and Jewish activists, known as the Umkhonto we Sizwe, are arrested by the apartheid South African government for conspiracy to commit sabotage.
The group joins Mandela in prison and is being held indefinitely without formal charge due to the government's 90-day detention law.
Bram Fischer, a sympathetic lawyer and head of the bar, risks his career and freedom to defend Mandela and the men from facing the death sentence.
Over the course of the film it is revealed that Bram is also part of Mandela's inner circle and becomes subject to a secret police investigation.
The film ends with the trial's conclusion, Mandela and the others get life imprisonment instead of the death penalty, and shortly after Bram is arrested.