Queer love story meets true crime thriller in the dream factory of 1970s cinema.

It is September 1974, two men meet by chance in Venice. One is a young English artist, in a panicked flight from London. The other is Donati, the magician of the Italian cinema, the designer responsible for realising the spectacular visions of Fellini and Pasolini. Donati is in Venice to produce sketches for Fellinis Casanova. A young and beautiful apprentice is just what he needs. 

He sweeps Nicholas to Rome, into the looking-glass world of Cinecitta, the studio where casanova's Venice will be ingeniously assembled. Then in the spring, the lovers move together to the set of Salo, Pasolinis horrifying fable of fascism. 

But Nicholas has a secret and in his world of constant illusion, his real nature passes unseen. Amidst the rising tensions of Italy's 'year of Lead' he acts as an accelerant, setting in motion a tragedy he didn't intend.