In the late 1970s – at a time when the fiercest propaganda against Western culture was being waged throughout the USSR – an ardent rock and roll fan sets up a successful and illegal underground jeans factory in a Latvian psychiatric hospital.
Agate – the older and well-off partner of Matiss and the mother of ten-year-old Paula dies unexpectedly. It becomes a devastating blow for Paula and a grand possibility for Matiss, a charming novice bailiff assistant and a cheating boyfriend, to “upgrade” his social status with Agates splendid house. Matiss and Paula are stuck together in order to find the only relative left – the missing brother of Agate. This journey leaves irreversible footprints on both of them.
A nightmarish evening unfolds for David, a former New York Times journalist, when he and his strange new neighbor Robert, accidentally hit a girl on her bike. Buzzed and disoriented, David lets Robert convince him to flee the scene and leave the girl for dead, in order to protect his career. Robert shows no remorse, and in the name of friendship he does unspeakable things to protect the secret. Now that the police are full-on hunting for the hit-and-run killer, things begin to spiral out of control when David’s local newspaper sends him to cover the story where he meets the deceased girl’s sister Vanessa. Despite the circumstances, and her deep desire to find her sister’s killer, the two immediately have a romantic connection, which surprises and haunts David, while pushing Robert to take brutal steps to keep his new friend to himself.
It is 1991 in Latvia and nineteen-year-old aspiring cinematographer Jazis’s whole world is thrown into chaos as he is dragged into the people’s peaceful protests against the Soviet Army’s attempted takeover of power in his country.