Sandra Laing (Sophie Okonedo) is born to white parents, Abraham Laing (Sam Neill) and Sannie Laing (Alice Krige). Yet she is dark due to a genetical enigma. Sandra naturally spots more with the blacks, because they don’t treat her with hatred and scorn. She and her parents are in conflict. There is a 1950 law barring South Africans from living or studying together with people of a different race. The Laing family takes it to the court to officially declare Sandra as white. But this has ramifications when she falls in loves with Petrus Zwane (Tony Kgoroge). They cannot legally live as man and wife because he is black.