 When Nora Walker (Ann-Margret) gets pregnant, her beloved husband, the pilot Captain Walker (Robert Powell), is considered missing in action in World War II when his plane crashes in a battle. Nora raises her son Tommy alone with the memories of his father. In 1951, she meets Franks Hobbs (Oliver Reed) in a summer camp, is courted by him, ending in an affair. However, in the middle of a stormy night, the boy has a nightmare with his father and runs to her mother s bed, finding her naked with "uncle" Frank, becoming immediately deaf, dumb and blind. The years go by, and her mother lives with a complex of guilty of the psychological problem of her son. One night, Tommy finds a pinball machine in a junkyard, and his natural skills transform him in a champion, and when he supersedes and heals his problems, a legion of fans follows him, as if he were a new Messiah.