Retired orchestra conductor Fred Ballinger is on vacation with his daughter Lena and his film director best friend Mick Boyle in the Alps when he receives an invitation from Queen Elizabeth II to perform for Prince Philip's birthday.

Fred and Mick, two old friends, are on vacation in an elegant hotel at the foot of the Alps. Fred, a composer and conductor, is now retired. Mick, a movie director, is still working. They look with curiosity and tenderness on their children's confused lives, Mick's enthusiastic young writers, and the other hotel guests. While Mick scrambles to finish the screenplay for what he imagines will be his last important movie, Fred has no intention of resuming his musical career. But someone wants at all costs to hear him conduct again.—Anonymous Love Revolver

Octogenarians Fred Ballinger and Mick Boyle have been friends for sixty years, are in-laws - Fred's daughter Lena and Mick's son Julian who are married to each other - and are currently staying at the same hotel resort in Wiesen, Switzerland, it a regular getaway for Fred and where he used to come with his wife, Melanie, who now lives in nearby Venice. While filmmaker Mick is there with the screenwriting team of his latest movie - what he is calling his testament - it a retreat to complete the treatment, most specifically the screenplay's final scene, Fred, a retired songwriter/composer and maestro, is there primarily for some medical tests while he otherwise relaxes. Lena, his personal assistant, is also there, albeit longer than she was planning, somewhat as Fred has been asked to come out of retirement for a special concert to conduct a performance of arguably his most famous song cycle, called The Simple Songs, made famous by Melanie, this concert which he is hesitant to do. One other common bond between the two friends is each having a failed marriage, and their youthful infatuations with the same girl, Gilda Black, about who they still talk. There are a few other notables at the resort, some with who they interact, while others they merely observe. They include: Jimmy Tree, a famous actor who laments being known for his schlock rather than for his more unknown serious work; a former South American athlete with health issues of his own, he who may be known as much for his star making plays as he is for a more infamous one; and Miss Universe. The interactions between this collective, especially between the two friends, leads to each entering into a process of self-discovery, the future for each which is different depending on where he/she currently is in life.—Huggo

Wiling away at a luxurious resort in the Swiss Alps, the retired silver-haired composer, Fred Ballinger, soaks in lazy ennui and indolence, until an emissary for Queen Elizabeth II approaches him, asking him to perform one of his early compositions at Prince Philip's birthday. However, as the legendary musician and his equally successful filmmaker friend, Mick, ponder on life's brevity; the inevitability of death; the suffocating absolutism of youth, and the perpetual adoration of beauty, a decision must be made. Will Fred agree to conduct his "Simple Song #3" in front of the prince?—Nick Riganas