Max, age thirty-five, is a nuclear physicist, he didn’t follow in the family footsteps, he didn’t become a lawyer, he didn’t want to get mixed up in construction sites and kickbacks, and doesn’t want to have anything to do with it now that his father is dead.
He is working on an important experiment called Helios, in the physics laboratory located inside the Gran Sasso, and is in charge of the experiment. For Max this is the chance of a lifetime, the fundamental test, but international competition is ruthless.
Working on the project with him is Anais, a French physicist, with whom Max has a romantic relationship.
Anais is in love, but lucid and critical towards him to the point of driving him into a corner when she notices that he has modified the results of the experiment.
Max loses everything, his reaction is violent and dramatic, and suddenly he finds himself catapulted on top of the mountain where nature is still rough and harsh, and the few human inhabitants there lead a mute existence and are hard as rocks.
The encounter with Bajram, a young Albanian shepherd, finally forces him to take a good look in the mirror.