A plastic surgeon and his nurse join a bizarre circus to escape from the police. Here he befriends deformed women and transforms them for his "Temple of Beauty". However, when they threaten to leave, they meet with mysterious accidents.
In Tiger Bay, the docklands of Cardiff, rough-and-tumble street urchin Gillie witnesses the brutal killing of a young woman at the hands of visiting Polish sailor Korchinsky. Instead of reporting the crime to the authorities, Gillie merely pockets a prize for herself — Korchinsky's shiny black revolver — and flees the scene. When Detective Graham discovers that Gillie has the murder weapon, the fiery young girl weaves a web of lies to throw him off course.
Based on the true story of Oberleutnant Franz von Werra, the only German prisoner of war captured in Britain to escape back to Germany during the Second World War.
