A priest's younger
brother runs off with a woman from a gang.
They live together, she gets pregnant and then both of them get sick
from a dangerous disease that is going around.
The baby gets born with serious disfiguring deformities and, with his
last breath, the brother asks the priest to care for the baby. Having no wife and no good place to keep such
a child as this, the priest still agrees and cares for and instructs the boy as
he would his own son. Knowing that the
boy would attract hostility because of his deformities, he keeps him in the
church, and warns him that it would be dangerous for him to go outside because
of the way people would treat him.
As was the custom of
the city in which the priest lived, an annual festival is underway in which the
gangs roam freely through the streets, fascinating people with magic tricks,
getting drunk, soliciting sex from strangers and robbing passers-by when the
opportunity arises. Angry about how this
kind of behavior had damaged his own family and concerned about the damage it
could cause to his community, the priest finally makes up his mind to ask the
king to outlaw this festival.
His nephew, having
become a very strong adolescent, become restless in his confinement, looks out
on the celebration and thinks to himself how much fun it would be to be down
there on the streets with all the excitement and activity. Rebelling against his uncle, he sneaks out of
the church and into the crowds. As his
uncle had warned him, the boy is badly abused by a gang and his uncle, hearing
about this, at considerable risk to himself, has to go into the crowds to
rescue the boy and return him to the safety of the church. In this he is aided by a young woman in the
gang, who feels guilty about the abuse her fellow gang members heaped on the
boy.
The priest was not
unscathed, however, by this encounter. His close proximity to this attractive
young woman, who cared for his son like a mother when others were cruel to him,
awakens in him a powerful desire to have her for his own. He now finds himself consumed with the memory
of her presence and struggles to remain faithful to his vows. She, on the other hand, concerned for the boy
and increasingly uncomfortable with her
lifestyle, comes to the priest's church one day to see how he is doing and seek
help in finding a different way. Shocked
to see her there, the priest nevertheless recovers himself enough to offer to
teach her about the ways of God, but he is unable to conceal the desire that
her presence triggers in him. She,
recognizing the signs, flees the church and he, angry at himself and her, warns
her never to return.
Torn between his
desire for the woman and the demands of his vocation, the priest prays but
finds no relief. Horrified by the power
his desire has over him, the priest convinces himself that the woman had used
her magic to ensnare him and determines not only to outlaw the festival, but to
drive the gangs out of the town and destroy the woman. He persuades the king to give him a military
force for this purpose and sets out on his mission. Coming to a brothel that is run by the gang
members, the priest demands that they turn over the woman to him. When they refuse, he orders that the place be
burned down. The captain of his military
force (who had visited this brothel previously for "recreation")
refuses, and the priest, infuriated by the insubordination, strips the captain
of his command and has the building burned.
The captain is
injured during this encounter and the young woman takes him to the church to
seek the boy's help in caring for him and out of a vague hope that the church
might provide a sanctuary for them. When
it becomes obvious that she can't stay, she gives the boy a map of where to
find her and flees the church. The
priest shows up soon afterwards, suspicious that the boy is sympathetic to the
woman, and the boy conceals the captain and denies any involvement with the
woman. Not convinced, the priest decides
to trap them by announcing that he knows where she is hiding and will send a
force there tomorrow to root them out.
Wanting to warn gang members, the boy and the captain follow the map to
their hideout, where they are promptly captured by the gang and sentenced to be
hung. The woman shows up and persuades
the gang that the captain and the boy are friends and has them released. The priest then arrives, having followed the
boy and the captain, and he has his force arrest the entire gang.
Having imprisoned
both the woman and the captain, the priest then offers to set them both free in
return for her company. Indignant, the
woman refuses, and the priest has them both confined together. The captain tries to persuade her to take up
the priest's offer to save her life, while the woman contemplates doing so to
save the captain's life. The following
morning, the captain is released and the priest offers the woman one last
chance for life on the same terms. She
spits in the priest's face, and he in rage has her burned. The boy, who has been struggling to find
courage to try to rescue the woman, finally runs to the pyre, frees her and
takes her back into the church, where she dies after thanking him. The priest sends the military force into the
church to capture them, but they are repelled when the boy pours molten lead
from a high window onto them. The
priest, however, is able to enter and he tries to persuade his nephew that all
is well and life can continue as it had previously now that the woman is dead,
but the boy calls his uncle a monster and throws him out of a high window to
his death.
And they close,
singing "who is a monster and who is a man?"
