Auschwitz, 1944. Saul Auslander is a Hungarian prisoner who works in one of the crematoriums at Auschwitz. He is forced to burn all the corpses of the inhabitants of his own town but, driven by his moral sense, tries to save from the flames the dead body of a young boy whom he believes to be his son and looks for a rabbi to be able to bury him decently. Saul walks away from the survivors and his rebellion plans in order to save the remains of a son whom he never cared for while he was still alive.