Just as the disheveled and alcoholic filmmaker Ismaël embarks on a difficult new film project, his life is sent into a tailspin. His wife Carlotta, presumed dead for 20 years, come crashing back into his life creating chaos in his work and his current romantic relationship with the starry-eyed astronomer Sylvia.

At the end of WWII, Jimmy Picard, a Native American Blackfoot who fought in France, suffers from unexplainable symptoms and is admitted to a military hospital. When doctors suspect schizophrenia, an eccentric psychoanalyst takes up the case and starts a conversation with the veteran.