Set around 1938, the film unfolds with a startling auction moment that changes the course of several lives. [Boorman](Mike Verdrengh) is taken to a psychiatric hospital after he bids an astonishing 32,000 Belgian francs for a worthless piece of paper, a move that raises questions about motive and sanity. [Frans Laarmans](Koen De Bouw) visits the psychiatrists, insisting that Boorman isn’t crazy and that there is a deeper story behind the bid, a thread that will pull him into a web of ambition and deception.
When Laarmans’s mother dies, the burden of paying for her embalming falls on the family. With little money on hand, Laarmans meets the publisher behind a glossy enterprise called the World Magazine for Finance, Trade, Industry, Art and Science—a publication Boorman claims has a global reach, with millions of copies sold worldwide and translations in many languages. He presents it as a reputable consumer journal that compares different companies within the same sector. The next edition is pitched to focus on funeral and undertaking services, which sets the stage for a troubling business proposal.
Boorman, always looking for fresh eyes, hires Laarmans and directs him to court new customers. One promising target is Mrs [Lauwereyssen](Willeke van Ammelrooy), the owner of an elevator business. The arrangement comes with two conditions: the undertaker must order a large batch of copies for their own purposes, and the price for the magazine will be steeply discounted if the undertaker, in turn, offers Laarmans a discount on embalming services. The undertaker agrees, and Laarmans enters a scheme that blends salesmanship with manipulation, following Boorman’s lead into a murky market where truth is malleable.
As the partnership deepens, Laarmans uncovers a disheartening truth: the World Magazine is a sham. There is no public circulation or subscribers—the “readers” are merely the companies that purchase the copies, turning the publication into an elaborate, inflated advertising brochure built on distorted figures and manipulated data. The supposed global reach is nothing more than a façade meant to justify inflated claims and seductive profits.
Mrs Lauwereyssen is revealed to be in a precarious financial position, its consequences mirrored in her failing business and the serious surgery needed for an infected leg. She signs on in hopes of an international breakthrough, even as she recognizes the risks. Laarmans feels sympathy for her plight and tries to dissuade her from the contract or at least to secure a smaller print run, but Boorman relents only so far, allowing payments to be made in twelve monthly installments. Yet Mrs Lauwereyssen, keenly aware of the deception and its toll, hesitates at the final instalment.
A subsequent market encounter brings grim news: Mrs Lauwereyssen’s leg has been amputated. Boorman, overwhelmed by remorse, offers a credit note of 32,000 Belgian francs, but she refuses to accept it. Boorman’s conscience continues to gnaw at him, prompting him to sue Mrs Lauwereyssen to compel payment; a judge dismisses the case for lack of evidence that she overpaid. The elevator company’s finances deteriorate, culminating in bankruptcy.
In a reflective return to the auction house, Boorman repeats the infamous bid of 32,000 francs for another worthless piece of paper, a moment that cements the moral crisis at the saga’s heart. Laarmans, feeling betrayed and constrained by the weight of the deceit, resigns from the fraudulent venture and starts a cheese shop, where he eventually meets Mrs Lauwereyssen again. She forgives him, acknowledging that she, too, should have seen the fraud, especially since her own medical prognosis had forewarned the loss of her leg.
The film closes with a quiet, almost clinical, museum encounter between Laarmans and Boorman. Boorman hopes to persuade a curator to take 1.5 million copies for the magazine’s next release, a last, unsettling bid to legitimize his ill-gotten enterprise and to keep the lie alive.
