Thomas and Hanna, a deliriously happy couple in their late 30s, buy an old house in the country with plans to fix it up over the summer. Hanna is looking forward to their time together - so when Thomas invites his older brother, Friedrich, who is deeply depressed over the failure of both his business and his marriage, to join them, she is disappointed by the intrusion. Easygoing, charming, and talkative, Thomas seeks to counterbalance the cloudier mood with an impetuous frenzy of activity, but Hanna retreats into sullenness and retaliates by bringing in her nubile young godchild Augustine until things smooth themselves out. Augustine's youthful sexiness has anything but a soothing impact on Thomas, however, whose adolescent impulses linger just below the surface.