It follows the adventures of a half-man, half-animal individual named Harry Haller, who in the Germany of the 1920s, is depressed, resentful of his middle class station, and wants to die not knowing the world around him.

He then meets two strange people who introduce him to life and a bizarre world called the "Magic Theater".

Directors Michelangelo Antonioni and John Frankenheimer, as well as the actor James Coburn were all touted to direct the film.

The reviewer, Jacoba Atlas, highlighted "one of the finest 'dream' sequences ever put on film [...] using every cinematic technique from step-printing to chromatic negatives".

Mr. von Sydow is reasonably tortured as the straddler of innocence and depravity and Miss Sanda exudes a hard, shallow beauty as his seductive counterpart.