A documentary on the life of the alcoholic writer Malcolm Lowry, interspersed with readings of Lowry's work by Richard Burton. Lowry was born and educated in England. He moved to Mexico in 1936, where he lived near the volcano Popocatepetl, on an allowance from his father. There, between drunken bouts, he started writing his one important novel, "Under the Volcano" that takes place on the Mexican day of the dead. He takes eight years to finish it, writing most of it while living in a shack in British Colombia, Canada.