Ruth loves Jesus. She has two teenage daughters, a husband and a house in the suburbs. She and her family are members of a Christian sect. Something changes when Ruth sees a man, who she strangely seems to know.
In her basement is a box full of pictures of the man and her. Long ago, she loved him. He has spent twenty years in prison for a murder that he claims not to have committed.
Ruth works as a veterinarian in a medical research company. She assists in a complicated surgery where the head of a rhesus monkey is transplanted onto the beheaded body of another monkey.
The man haunts Ruth’s life like a phantom from the past. He seems to circle around her in the shadow, waiting for the right moment to emerge back into her life. She is torn between the wish to keep up her comfortable domestic existence and the destructive attraction to her past lover. The door to the underground has sprung open and Ruth starts to investigate. The forest bears secrets, her daughters are two-faced and the beheaded monkey is in misery. Ruth takes a plunge into the dark ocean, which is undercutting the thin foundation of her beliefs.
Ruth leaves her home, her family and her faith behind.!
