The plot is structured on two parallel stories, one related to events of Nina’s life, the other focused on her professional activity as film editor. It is in this role that she becomes deeply involved in a film she is editing whose dramatic implications seem to recall events of her own life. The starting point is a dream of a family tragedy that reveals the background of her story and that triggers a mechanism of obsession which is represented through a dense symbolic apparatus: an irreparable malaise becomes then the focus of the story till its natural conclusion.
Two characters are particularly functional to the plot development.
Giulio, Nina’s husband, finds it difficult to relate to his wife in her pathological state of mental disorder though he feebly tries to bring her back to her normal state. She lives in a constant state of torment for a sense of loss, interpreting whatever happens around her as a premonitory sign of catastrophic events. In this respect, the window of the neighbours that often reveals fragments of quarrels between husband and wife and that Nina observes with a sort of perverse attention, works as a mirror in which she prefigures the dreaded end of her own marriage. The sea is another important presence in the development of the story; indeed, two fundamental scenes are set on a boat in a threatening night atmosphere where Nina is alone while Giulio’s image disappears form the plot. What has happened to him? Has he drowned or has he been intentionally and ruthlessly eliminated? Has he run away leaving no trace behind him? The case remains suspended in a suitable mystery.
Then we find Nina again in her apartment, at night, a time in which the horror and pain seem to be supported by nature. From this moment, the plot narrates Nina’s crazy search for her missing husband in every male figure, and, in this respect, Francesco, a helpful and sweet friend, seems ready to offer an honest loving feeling in a relationship of which he ignores the hidden dangers. In the last moments Francesco will be the inadequate spectator to the dramatic epilogue.