The successful singer Luis Dimas goes along with his driver, known as Takilleitor, touring the cities of Chile. They are joined by two former agents of the Central Nacional de Informaciones (CNI), Chile's national intelligence service during the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet, who are chasing a kind of wooden parrot containing a supposed political message.

In the middle of the Atacama Desert is the last saltpetre settlement still inhabited. Known as Maria Elena, its inhabitants are reluctant to leave it behind, clinging to their memory and to their dead.