The film tells the story of Karol Rathaus, a composer believed to be one of the most promising representative of his generation of European composers, the generation that came of age during or right after WWI and was decimated by the rise of the Nazis in Germany and the subsequent war in Europe. According to an accepted narrative, Rathaus was one of the lucky few, who not only escaped the horrors of the Holocaust, but managed to build a stable and happy life in his new homeland. The film challenges this happy narrative bringing to focus Rathaus’ failures and disappointments hiding underneath the outward appearance of happiness. It digs into the personal, cultural, and political circumstances surrounding the composer’s life from the beginning of his career in Vienna and Berlin, his escape from Germany in 1932, until his death in New York in 1954. It follows the composer’s life as he struggles with existential questions: “How one could remain a German composer after Germany succumbed to the evils of Nazism? What kind of composer should he become in his new homeland? Where did his ethno-cultural loyalties lie?”