Plain-looking and partially deaf, Carla (Emmanuelle Devos) is the butt of office jokes. Thirty five years old, she feels her life is going nowhere, until one day when she makes the decision to hire trainee Paul (Vincent Cassel), ten years her junior, good looking and who has just got out of prison.
Isolated from society, they develop a mutually beneficial relationship: she uses his skills as a thief to get back at colleagues by stealing office documents, he gets her to read the lips of a criminal who's skimming money from a nightclub.
The fascination lies in watching great performances by the central pair as they manipulate each other while the sexual temperature rises.