This candid documentary gives account of the Chereau-Boulez production of ' 'The Ring of the Nibelung'' in Bayreuth.

Chereau, the “enfant terrible'' of French theatre, insisted that the Wagner cycle must be good theatre, taught his singers to act, transferred the story into the industrial age, and firmly broke with the traditional approach to Wagner's trilogy. Boulez himself had clashes with the orchestra, which resisted the realisation of the conductor's conception of the music. All of this, and more, is faithfully recorded in the documentary.