Crotchety retired doctor Isak Borg travels from Stockholm to Lund, Sweden, with his pregnant and unhappy daughter-in-law, Marianne, in order to receive an honorary degree from his alma mater. Along the way, they encounter a series of hitchhikers, each of whom causes the elderly doctor to muse upon the pleasures and failures of his own life. These include the vivacious young Sara, a dead ringer for the doctor's own first love.
Sören Mårtensson is a middle school teacher. His classroom occupied by half-grown children. His work is tormenting him and at night he is haunted by nightmares.
A Swedish housewife begins an adulterous affair with a foreign archaeologist. But he is an emotionally scarred man, a Jewish survivor from a concentration camp, consequently, their relationship will be painfully difficult.
