The Russian poet Andrei Gorchakov, accompanied by guide and translator Eugenia, is traveling through Italy researching the life of an 18th-century Russian composer. In an ancient spa town, he meets the lunatic Domenico, who years earlier had imprisoned his own family in his house for seven years to save them from the evils of the world. Seeing some deep truth in Domenico’s act, Andrei becomes drawn to him. In a series of dreams, the poet’s nostalgia for his homeland and his longing for his wife, his ambivalent feelings for Eugenia and Italy, and his sense of kinship with Domenico become intertwined.

The film is an odd retelling of the story of Hercules battling the wizard Minos, who uses “science” in an attempt to take over the world. Hercules must stop him and rescue his princess love in the process. Part of the adventure finds Hercules battling giant robots brought to life by stop motion animation.

Several people disappear from and at the sea. Their bodies are found gnawed to the skeleton, even the marrow is missing. The scientists have no idea which animal could do such things. Dr. Turner begins to suspect that the company which builds a tunnel beneath the bay might have poisoned the environment and caused an octopus to mutate to giant dimensions…