Rudolf Wohlgemuth leads a stoic hermit life in his provincial watchmaker's workshop. The small business used to be a well-known manufacture with a few journeymen, but now the shop with the ambitious Karina only employs one employee. Both hardly exchange a word with each other, but at work they mesh like the gears of a clockwork. The cozy little world threatens to collapse when Rudolf's brother Klaus, who produces cheap watches in Hong Kong, unexpectedly demands his share of the inheritance from his parents' business. Rudolf pretends that he cannot pay because he has just started a family. Klaus spontaneously announces his visit, happily surprised by his brittle brother's way of life. In his distress, Rudolf asks the single parent Karina and her daughter Julia to move in with him for a few days to play "family". The stand-up theater works amazingly well: Fake wedding photos and a little paint on the walls wake Rudolf's dusty room from its dreary bachelorette.