Lajos Mezei is a middle-aged, insignificant, average man. He works at the post office sorting letters with a machine. His life is but a series monotonous everyday events, but he has a passion that makes him different from his fellow humans. This passion replaces all human relationships and events in his life. He flees into a world of his own, hermetically sealed, which only he can understand and where he therefore feels safe. One day, however, his well-balanced life is turned upside down.

This is the story of Rodya Raskalnikov (Patrick Dempsey), an intellectual who is suspended from University and is living in poverty in 19th century Russia. Raskalnikov believes that in order for great men like Napoleon to accomplish great things, they must be above the law.