One day, a Neurinos shuttle arrives with a new scientist named Elisa, carrying a new prisoner of unknown origins who was found as the sole survivor in a shipwreck and wakes up from hypersleep severely disoriented and unable to speak.

He is introduced to the other inmates: their leader César; his right-hand man Lazare, who developed the ability to hold his breath to escape the gas with which the prisoners are sedated; the large and violent Moloch, who is César's enforcer; the reclusive Bouddha, who has the habit of trying to murder whoever is in pain out of misguided compassion; the deranged anarchist hacker Attila; and Raspoutine, a deeply religious man who claims the new one was sent by God to save them, and starts calling him "Saint-Georges, the Dragonslayer", because of a tattoo on his arm.

However, while the staff is examining his corpse, Saint-Georges wakes up completely healed, grabs Elisa and uses her as a hostage to reach the prison quarters before releasing her.

Attila appears and tells the others of his plans to destroy them all out of spite, by making the space station crash into the planet, triggering the rage of the other prisoners.

After having finally opened the hatch, the group finds the cooling system overheated so now the corridor that leads to the manual controls is filled with boiling coolant.

Variety critic Lisa Nesselson praised the film as a "throbbing, disturbing fairy tale" and pointed to Caro's "breathtaking dark style", which the director had already demonstrated in Delicatessen and The City of Lost Children together with his close friend and collaborator Jean-Pierre Jeunet.

Nesselson also praised lead actor Lambert Wilson who delivers a committed, almost wordless performance and is "fabulously muscular and expressive".

As well as stating that Caro's first directorial work in twelve years had "astonishingly stupid" dialogue, "cumbersome symbolism", no humor and seemed significantly longer than two hours.