Human Nature

Puff provides testimony before Congress, recounting his life and the clash between civilization and wild instinct. This framing moment sets up the flashback structure that follows, underscoring the film's meditation on humanity's 'waywardness'.

During her 20s, Lila chooses to abandon civilization after a brief freak-show stint and escapes to the forest. She embraces a free, natural life, growing thick hair and living among the trees.

Lila crafts and publishes a best-selling memoir about her naked, savage, and free life in the woods, celebrating nature and personal freedom. The book catapults her to public attention and contrasts with what comes later when she reenters civilization.

At age thirty, driven by strong sexual desire, Lila returns to civilization and undergoes hair removal to fit conventional beauty standards. She begins a search for a partner who can accept her transformed self.

Lila meets Dr. Nathan Bronfman, a psychologist studying the possibility of teaching table manners to mice. The two begin a personal and professional alliance that shapes the ensuing events.

On a hike, Lila spots a naked man living as a wild animal who has spent his life in the forest. She strips, chases him, and he falls from a tree branch, unconscious.

The unconscious man is brought to Nathan's lab, where he is named Puff— a name inspired by Nathan's French assistant Gabrielle's childhood dog. A phone call reveals Gabrielle's true identity behind the accent.

With the help of Gabrielle and Lila, Nathan begins conditioned reinforcement training to instill manners and high culture in Puff. Despite progress, Puff struggles to fully control his sexual urges.

To demonstrate his progress, Nathan takes Puff on tour. Puff secretly drinks heavily and patronizes prostitutes, exposing the gap between training and instinct.

Nathan's relationship with Lila deteriorates as Gabrielle seduces him, complicating the trio's dynamics. Meanwhile Lila decides she will undo Puff's training and return him to his natural state.

Lila retrieves Puff from civilization and returns him to the forest, where they live naked together again. Their rewilding is interrupted when a threatening Nathan confronts them, and Puff kills Nathan.

Lila turns herself in as the murderer and asks Puff to testify about the waywardness of humanity. Puff agrees and, after a brief encounter with his biological mother, prepares to return to his forest home.

Following the forest return, Puff emerges with Gabrielle and they drive into the city to eat, while Puff looks back thoughtfully at the forest as if weighing everything that happened.

Two philosophical passages are read during the credits: William of Ockham on intuitive cognition and Francis Bacon on inductivism. The readings frame the film's meditation on knowledge, belief, and interpretation of events.