Two primitive shepherds, Bo and Bu, live among ruins in the desert. One day the two men come across a young woman in a sandy waste who shows evidence of having been injured. Fragments of foreign objects are lying about nearby. The light-haired and seemingly cultivated woman has lost her memory as a result of some terrible experiences and can no longer speak. Renamed Ba, she struggles, however humbly, against being forced into the role of a slave. The men humiliate and abuse her in every way imaginable and finally sell her. Somewhere close by is a town where archaic Eastern customs prevail although a modern military presence points to the current state of things. . . . This didactic story about male superiority and brutality has been elaborated in the form of an allegory, and is set in an unspecified, timeless central Asian location. Although the film reveals the darkest aspects of human nature and a horribly barbaric perception of the world, all scenes are captured by the camera of a sophisticated aesthete. The resulting effect is an endless flow of beautiful images.