The film opens with a sequence of fleeting images - the stamens of a flower, drops of oil on water, glowing embers, a spider's web, a strand of blonde hair, a leaf frozen in the ice, rain dripping from a wooden roof, etc.

The central figure of Szindbád, although his name makes reference to the character of Sinbad in the Arabian Nights, here belongs to the last years of the Austro-Hungarian empire around the turn of the 20th century (the period during which the original stories were written).

Szindbád is a middle-aged traveller driven by memories of his amorous adventures (and of the favourite meals he has savoured along the way); he is an observer of life as it passes by rather than an active participant in it, and his inner world is conveyed in a stream of consciousness reflecting his unsatisfied desires and his nostalgia for the past.

[3] The rich colour photography (its "tactile sensuality"[4]) created by cinematographer Sándor Sára was central to the evocation of the refined and elegant social world of the Hungarian bourgeoisie at the turn of the century.

[6] The film's non-linear and fragmented structure allows the linking of images, sometimes almost subliminally, to evoke Szindbád's memories or his subconscious, and the description "Proustian" has repeatedly appeared in critical assessments (perhaps echoing a frequent characterization of the writings of the author of the original stories, Gyula Krúdy).