Bright young soldier Mertsi suffers a permanent brain injury in the Second World War. In the late 1940s he wanders around the Finnish countryside looking for simple work and relying on other people's help. A workmate, Ville, tells him about his clever Spitz dog back home and the problems with her overlong dew claws. Together with his helpful war buddy Eetvi, Mertsi joins a lumber camp in the middle of a freezing winter, tries hard but finds the work there too strenuous for his body and mind. While he still sees nightmares about the war, in the daytime he keeps dreaming and worrying about the dog...
During the spring harvest, a strange man arrives in the village on the shores of Lake Pielinen, carrying a rifle and a backpack. He is a skilled worker, a ruthless talker, and a ladies' man. By the time the autumn snow falls, the village has changed. No one can quite figure out the man. He calls himself Simpauttaja. Based on Heikki Turunen's award-winning debut novel, the film is a tragicomic portrayal of rural change.
Young advertising executive Vatanen suddenly quits his job and his whole life in Helsinki, and decides to spend a while in the Finnish wilderness. A wounded hare hit by a car becomes his travel companion. Together they find reclusion in the Finnish Lapland, soon to be disturbed by a noisy group of foreign tourists and their pretentious Finnish hosts. When the hare gets ill and needs to see a vet, Vatanen must return to the city and finally face the choice between his new and former life
