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This Indonesian melodrama is about the victimization of a young girl, first by her father and later by other men. When little Ponirah is born, her mother dies as a result of complications, and Ponirah's father blames the newborn for his wife's death. After some years have gone by, Ponirah happens to be with her brother when he dies in an accident, and this time her father not only blames her for the death but sends her away to be cared for by a nurse (Christine Hakim). Self-sacrificing and devoted, the nurse is so poor that she cannot support them on the small amount of income she has, and in desperation she becomes a prostitute and takes Ponirah to live with her in a brothel. As the young girl observes the behavior of the "clients" and others, she starts to hate men with a passion -- yet as time goes by, it appears as though her hatred is not enough to change her dreary, exploitative future.