One Mother's Day, two old women reflect on their relationships with their children--present and absent--and with the same adulterous man. When their paths cross at a crucial moment, one woman's refusal to accept the help of her husband's secret lover leads to her death.

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.

Though numerous social workers try to step in, a co-dependent mother and son bounce from city to city, in search of a place where they can be together at all times.

A working-class mother has held only one hope for her entire life: that one day, her daughter would marry well and wealthy, and take care of her in her old age. When her daughter reveals that the man she loves is not wealthy, her mother's dreams of rest are dashed and divided.

A man meets his girlfriend’s mother. While at first she is cold to him, because of a secret his girlfriend won’t speak of, they grow close, begin to depend on each other.

A woman's complicated relationship to her mother is captured in three vignettes: one from directly after her death, one from when she is still alive, and one from years after she is gone.

A mother, upon helping a girl at a playground one day, contemplates the nature of her marriage and the daughter who came from it.

A mother sorrowfully recounts her daughter’s first love and its destructive effects.

A nanny is dismissed from her post after her employer discovers incriminating correspondences from an ex-lover in Saudi Arabia.

A daughter wakes up her mother to ask how much money she made from the dog races — but instead the mother distractedly dwells on her troubling encounters with men.