法国悲剧剧情片。伊斯迈尔因其知识分子的自由思想，在阿尔及利亚故乡遭到威胁，他逃到法国避难。他以寓言童话的方式写信给其妻子和女儿，叙述他偷渡的过程。在距此数百公里的奥维涅地区，一个法国农民家庭接到小儿子西蒙因车祸突然死亡的噩耗。葬礼当天，死者的父亲陷入令人担忧的悲痛之中，他其他的儿子拒绝接受上帝的帮助。导演透过两个独立的故事，探讨非法移民和生离死别的问题。

三十多歲的也斯不停轉換工作。日間他任導遊或營地輔導員，晚上則在一所救濟窮人的食堂中當義工。他住在一輛拖車內，過着避世和脫離現實的生活。也斯為人積極，富幽默感但有時又很暴力。他正在尋找某些東西，然而他卻不想與任何事扯上關係。不想再做一個「移民的兒子」，如一般人心目中所認為的是行為暴力或順從地融入社會。 也斯重遇昔日的同學。一直以來他都小心避開不想與他們相見，但要來的總是避不開，終於一次過全部相遇在一起。舊日的記憶：被排擠、渴望獲得賞識、童年時的挫折等數之不盡又不能接受的回憶再次一一湧現。也斯必須堅決地擺脫這些糾纏才能有望向前邁進

Manoel de Oliveira plays his film in three stages: the first part - a play, the second can be roughly defined as a silent film (with the behind the scenes read excerpts from Beckett works), but in the end the director brilliantly performs the same material of the avant-garde exercise. Surprisingly, a joke, repeated three times, each time everything sounds fresh and develops into an almost verbatim adaptation of the biblical "Book of Job" - a spectacular point in a parable about how hard to empathize with other people's misery, when you have your own.

Ernesto, a seven-year-old boy who has the body of a thirty-year-old man, decides, upon attending his first day of school, that he no longer wishes to attend, because he does not wish to be taught matters that he does not know.