Santa Sangre

In a mental asylum, a naked man named Fenix clings to a tree trunk in a cell. A doctor and nurses coax him down using a raw fish, which he begins to eat. As they dress him in coveralls, a phoenix tattoo on his chest becomes visible.

Years earlier, Fenix is a child magician in Circo del Gringo, run by his father Orgo and mother Concha. The circus features Alma, a deaf-mute mime and tightrope walker, plus Aladin the dwarf, a pack of clowns, and an elephant.

Orgo flirts publicly with the tattooed woman in the circus. Concha leads Alma, the adopted deaf-mute mime and tightrope walker whom Fenix loves.

Concha also leads a religious cult whose patron saint is a girl who was raped and had her arms cut off. The landowner wants to raze their temple, but followers resist; a Catholic Monsignor visits to resolve the conflict, but deems the temple sacrilegious, and demolition proceeds.

Fenix leads Concha back to the circus, where she discovers Orgo's affair. Orgo hypnotizes Concha and rapes her.

The circus elephant dies and is paraded through the city in a giant casket; hundreds of scavengers tear it apart. Orgo tattoos a phoenix on Fenix's chest with a knife dipped in red ink, telling him this marks him as a man.

During Concha's aerial act, she sees Orgo with the tattooed woman. She pours sulfuric acid on Orgo's genitals; in retaliation, Orgo cuts off Concha's arms and then slits his own throat.

The film returns to the present; Fenix is taken to a movie theater with Down syndrome patients. A pimp offers cocaine and introduces them to a fat prostitute—the tattooed woman—now a prostitute; Fenix spots her and is consumed with rage.

Back at the asylum, Fenix's armless mother calls out to him from the street. He escapes by climbing down a rope from his cell window.

The tattooed woman attempts to prostitute Alma; an unseen assailant stabs her to death, and Alma later discovers the body.

Fenix and Concha perform 'Concha and Her Magic Hands,' with him behind her to move his arms as if they were Concha's. Concha uses Fenix's limbs to kill women she deems interesting, maintaining control. She taunts him, claiming she will always be inside him.

Alma and Fenix struggle, and he drives a knife into Concha's stomach; she vanishes, taunting that she will always be inside him. Flashbacks reveal Concha died after being maimed by Orgo, and Fenix has kept a mannequin of his armless mother.

He destroys his homemade temple and throws away the mannequin with the help of his imaginary friends, Aladin and the clowns.

Alma removes Fenix's artificial fingernails and leads him outside as police order them to raise their hands. Fenix realizes he has regained control of his hands and feels joy and peace.