Callan is twenty and is overcome with impulses that he finds it increasingly difficult to control. In order to protect others from his strange behavior, Malcolm, his father, tries to channel his son's attention by every means possible.

In a small nook of heat-drenched coastal Australia, a traveling knife salesman, Tom, visits upon Mary, a frustrated housewife. As blades grind on stone, tensions build as Mary’s two boisterous children observe the couple playing out their all too familiar roles.