Set in a provincial 1950s English coastal town, a black comedy about obsession and murder which traces the doomed relationships and Oedipal goings-on between a mother, Marjorie Beasly, her daughter Joyce and an orphaned, young sailor, Harold, who washes up in town with little more than his estranged brother's address to build a new life on. Mrs. Beasly, decides to take in this lodger who has an addiction to sweets taken to calm his violent tendencies. Mrs. Beasly, attempts to maintain the illusion of herself as the upholder of tradtional family values, she makes it her business to seduce the vulnerable Harold--mindless of the uncomfortable position in which both her husband and daughter are placed... Behind the curtains of their immaculate home, the seeds of discontent have been sown.