Sweden, 1981. Married couple Ivar and Pål set out for a gay sauna hoping to try out something new and add some zest to the partner stereotype. They head for an establishment that operates by the motto: “What happens in the sauna, stays in the sauna”. They both hope they’ll leave the place just as besotted with each other as they were when they arrived. 1981 is a film which blends explicit eroticism with fragile love in a tale of everyday life and the kind of excesses one should only treat oneself to once in a while.