When Robert Walter, the popular mayor of Amsterdam, sees his wife toss her head back with laughter while chatting with another man at a New Year's reception, he immediately suspects the worst. Despite their long and happy marriage, Robert is convinced that his wife, Sylvia, is cheating on him. While Robert is normally preoccupied with his phone, the newspapers, and his own thoughts while at home, he now starts to be almost alarmingly attentive and interested - ultimately losing himself in increasingly panicked and paranoid trains of thought. Robert's sadistic skill for undermining himself and his marriage comes to cost him nearly everything.