Police investigator Galvão is pursuing two trails, one professional and one personal. While he looks for a serial killer, he also searches for his estranged daughter, Sandra, whom he kicked out of the house. Lives intersect when the serial killer, Toninho, befriends Sandra, now an exotic dancer and prostitute living and working in the seamy underside of late 1970s Rio.

Professor Romo, a university psychology teacher, challenges his class to prove a bizarre theory. Among his students is his estranged daughter, Ana Lía. Determined to mend their fractured relationship, he unwittingly sets off a chain of events that only deepens the divide between them.