Variation, based on the book by Hiroyuki Itsuki, a novelist especially popular with women, was the final work of the late Nakahira. His previous themes of first love, disppointment, anguish and tenderness are projected as the undercurrent to this story of the renewed love of two former university students. They meet dramatically who Morii, a political radical on the run from the police, is concealed by Kyoko while performing a puppet show at the university. Their affair is cut short when Morii is forced to go into hiding. When they renew their affair ten years later after an accident meeting in Paris, the same desperation inherent in their young love again clouds their relationship: Morii's fugitive years have subjected him to a stress which has made him impotent, and once again Kyoko is plagued by Morii's inability to love her totally. Only escape seems to hold hope for reconciling their situation, and the two plan to steal away to the south of France but it seems that the couple are doomed to play only a variation on the same tragic theme of their love.