After being the sole unfortunate witness to a domestic quarrel that ends up in murder, Patrascu finds himself at odds with two very close neighbors: one is the bizarre murderer. The other is his very own conscience.

In August 1983, architect Dinu Neagu together with his wife and two children, a boy and a girl, are on a beach of nudists near an industrial area. He is arrested and taken to Bucharest police office, where he is imprisoned in a cell together with Vali, a collaborator of the Security Service.

Ilie, a small-town police chief, wants to build a modest comfortable life for himself, but ends up making the wrong choices. Middle-aged and alienated, he feels the need to be a part of something – to build an orchard, even a home. Although dubious things happen in the village, Ilie only sees what suits him. The moment he gets involved in the village marks the beginning of his collapse. In a vacuum of solutions, he tries to be what he has never been before: the justice seeker who arrests everyone guilty.