Adapting one of Gabriel García Márquez's finest works, Arturo Ripstein confirms his standing as Mexico's foremost auteur with this deeply moving tale of an old couple's painful memories and false hopes. In a small coastal Mexican town in the late forties, a retired army official and his asthmatic wife are going through hard times, scarred by the death of their only son and struggling to avoid eviction from their home. The Colonel blindly sets his hopes on two dreams: that his pension will suddenly arrive after 27 years, and that his son's fighting gamecock will bring untold riches. For Ripstein there is neither good nor evil, only the interaction of contradictory emotions under the inexorable hand of fate.