It's 1972. Dr. Joanna Bereza is a psychiatric intern who wants to have it all: a career, a loving marriage, and a family. But her passion to do what's right sets her against Dr. Myron Eisenstadt, an arrogant psychiatrist and a system that's as stuck as the people it treats. On ward 2B, Joanna becomes obsessed with the treatment of two women: a mute young mother suspected of trying to kill her baby and a feisty old woman who's been through the mill one too many times. Blinded by her obsession, Joanna not only neglects her own husband, but in trying to stop her patients from getting shock treatment, she also puts her career in jeopardy. Further complicating matters is the seductive senior resident who looks more like a hip rock star than an aspiring shrink. Shadowing Joanna's work is her own unresolved grief over something that happened when she was a child.