An orchestra assembles for a rehearsal in an ancient chapel under the inquisitive eyes of a TV documentary crew, but an uprising breaks out.

Tommaso, a young boy growing up in a big family in the country often spies on cousin Marta. Then she marries and moves away. The film then following the courses of both their lives. Tom grows up and goes into military service, Marta is separated from her husband.

The German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche and his Jewish companion Paul Ree meet a beautiful young Russian intellectual and draw her into a ménage-à-trois.