When a mother takes her children to buy a puppy from another mother, she finds an unsettling household and a child chained like a dog in the backyard. Through their alternating narratives, both mothers reflect on what it means to love your children.

In an attempt to impress his emotionally distant father, a boy ridicules his mother, who has loved him unconditionally even in his father's absence. Wracked with guilt, he yearns for her forgiveness - only to find that she does not hold it against him.

A couple adopts a troubled six year old child who takes a startling interest in one very precious item in their home.

Over dinner, an observer reflects on mothers and their omnipresent prevalence in children’s lives.

When a man's son visits with his new girlfriend, the father worries that she is only interested in the grand house and family money. The father knows he should not intervene in his son's relationship, but the more time he spends with them, the more he dislikes her and the more difficult it gets to stay quiet.

A blissfully naïve young couple hopes to avoid the fate of the husband's unhappy parents, but as his jealous mother, children, and resentments come between them, the young couple falls into the same pitfalls.

On the day of her mother's funeral, a young woman reminisces about the summers during her childhood spent with her family and friends at their lakeside cabin. As she considers her parents' nontraditional relationship, she also wonders about her own love life.

After he gets divorced, a father finds renewed purpose through his role as a single parent and the precious time he spends with his children.

A woman with minimal relationship experience deals with the aftermath of her choice between her first love and her sick father.

In post-World War II Japan, a boy is raised by his frigid father without love and spends the rest of his life endlessly pursuing it.