Bill Rohan, a young boy living on the outskirts of London experiences the exhilaration of World War II, as seen through the eyes of director John Boorman, who also wrote and produced the autobiographical film. During this period, Bill learns about sex, death, love, hypocrisy, and the faults of adults as he prowls the ruins of bombed houses on Rosehill Avenue. His childlike father is off chasing patriotic dreams of glory from behind a military clerk’s typewriter; his teenage sister runs wild; his mother can’t cope; and everything in the end will eventually turn out all right.