Cornelius Blum is spat out by the sea, a strange character who seems to have lived a thousand lives. He heads with the wind towards a lost village that seems to have been waiting for him for a long time. Immediately enthroned as "miller", he builds his mill on top of the cliff overlooking the village. Everything would be fine if the new miller was not inhabited by an irresistible impulse that pushes him to violently express his emotions by screaming from the top of his cliff every night, an impulse that drives him away from his beloved and attracts him the enmity of the village.