 This is an enigmatic story of a man (Walker), suffering from dwarfism, who writes an autobiographical account of his life. In flashbacks, we see how he was conceived to a french woman (Parillaud) at the end of WWII as she attempts to smuggle herself to America on a troop ship. Caught, she is put ashore in Ireland where she struggles to bring up her dwarfed child. After a short lived affair with Jack Kelly(Byrne)an officer from the ship she stowed away on, who becomes a surrogate father to the boy, teaching him about the stars and planets... After that affair she meets with Terry(Dillon), a drifter who also remembers her from the ship. He takes her and the boy to America, but they are misfits in the prairie lands of the West and soon return home to Ireland where the boy grows to manhood as a writer. An interesting twist at the end brings it together beautifully.