1974. The Night Porter reaches cinemas and triggers a storm of controversy, censorship and scandal. The film reconstructs the birth and reception of a work that shaped cinema history and still questions the boundary between artistic freedom and responsibility when representing real trauma such as Auschwitz.

The documentary opens and closes with a symbolic moment: on 30 August 2023, Liliana Cavani receives the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement at the Venice Film Festival from Charlotte Rampling. From there, the film retraces the rise and scandal surrounding The Night Porter, showing how that work left an indelible mark on both the director and the actress—and how it still divides audiences. Through archive materials, testimonies and contextual analysis, the film addresses censorship, controversy, and the central question: should art set limits when it touches real tragedies, and who has the authority to decide them?