In the 1800s a naturalist marries into a family of British country gentry.

The movie is a study of a family of country gentry in Victorian England. William Adamson (Mark Rylance), a young scientist, is introduced into the Alabaster family by Sir Harald Alabaster (Jeremy Kemp) who is also fascinated by insects. William marries the elder daughter of the family and studies the amounts of insects in the garden of the villa. His - for the gentry - strange behaviors reveal at the same time their own failures and passions.—Volker Boehm

Taken in the countryside manor of his grand benefactor, the Victorian aristocrat Sir Harald Alabaster (Jeremy Kemp), the penniless but brilliant entomologist, William Adamson (Mark Rylance), accepts an assistant position to catalogue his wealthy patron's specimen collection. However, as a fervent romance with the patriarch's alluring oldest daughter, Eugenia (Patsy Kensit), will soon lead to marriage, little by little, William will become enmeshed in the microcosm of the Alabasters, as he discovers the family's uncomfortable and well-hidden secret. Will the scientist ever become one of them?—Nick Riganas