Elia (Toni Servillo, "The Great Beauty") is a Jewish psychoanalyst from a purely Freudian school of thought. Due to his austere and detached manner, he is reputed for immediately generating awe in his patients. Elia lives alone in a flat on the same floor as his ex-wife, Giovanna, with whom he is still secretly in love. After a minor illness, his doctor prescribes an iron-rich diet and physical activity to lose a few extra kilos. That is how he chances upon Claudia, a personal trainer with the cult of physique but clearly not of mind...