Antonino is committed to a mental asylum where he is the passive witness of the time going by, a diary takes his moods, his physical sufferings. He spends whole days alone, drawing multicolored butterflies. After more than twenty years he is discharged and can savor the taste of freedom. The maire assigns him a flat in a council house and while looking for it he meets his neighbour, Andrea, who helps him. This is an artist who is living an existential crisis which hinders him to create new works and to keep to the agreements with his manager, Harold, a cynic businessman dealing in the world of art. This time spent next to Antonino rouses Andrea's curiosity. Antonino brings his friends in the court of the asylum where he lived once and tells him about the story of a horse "Mario the Horse" Even though his manager keeps on insisting that he has to be present to an exhibition of his works, Andrea decides to send Antonino at his place, challenging Harold's wrath who is forced by the ...