Dir.: Ivan Fila; Script: Ivan Fila; Phot.: Vladimir Smutný; Ed.: Ivana Davidová; Mus.: Petr Hapka; Cast: Lenka Vlasáková, Christian Redl, Hanna Schygulla, Miroslav Donutil, Udo Kier, Gerd Lohmeyer; Prod.: Ivan Fila, Herbert Rimbach, Ivan Fila Filmproduktion, Avista Film, Kellerstrasse 37, 81667 Munich (Allemagne), tél.: (089) 448 12 98, fax: (089) 448 75 02; Sales: Cinepool, Sonnenstrasse 21, 80331 Munich (Allemagne), tél.: (089) 558 76 226, fax: (089) 558 76 188 .

Herbert Strehlow, a 51-year-old widower, restores furniture for a living. One day in 1991, on a trip to his native Slovakia to settle a matter of family property, he meets 21-year-old Lea and is immediately struck by her resemblance to his late wife. Lea hasn't spoken a word since her childhood, but Strehlow falls in love with the disturbed young woman and pays her foster parents 50,000 marks to allow him to take her to Denmark where, against Lea's will, he marries her. Lea hasn't talked since she was seven, when her father killed her mother, but she hasn't stopped dreaming about her mother or writing poems to her every day. Lea hates Strehlow, who is given to violent outbursts that remind her of her father. Gradually, however, she begins to see beyond Strehlow's temperamentality and he, in turn, begins to appreciate Lea for more than her appearance. They begin to realize that they are bound by a kind of spiritual kinship, each having been traumatized by the death of a beloved. Strehlow's hard exterior begins to soften and his feelings toward Lea soon generate a response.