The jazz cats call him Saint Sullivan, but he's far from pious. Musician Barry Sullivan drinks too much, can't keep a job, and fights with his fiery Mexican wife. Ceci, their young daughter, witnesses their fury from the shadows. The child finds comfort with plaster saints and the spirits of her ancestors-until a tragic accident threatens her body and soul.

Great-aunt Pilar fears the Evil Eye and decides to intervene, taking Ceci and her family to a traditional Mexican healer, a curandera. Even in the ultra-modern Los Angeles of 1960, ancient ways survive in the barrio. The curandera prescribes an unconventional pharmacopeia of folk remedies, compassion, humor, and stories, which charm the ailing child.

Barry is caught between two worlds-the jazz scene, where he speaks the lingo, and the barrio, where he is a clueless foreigner stumbling into a dangerous feud. He teeters on the brink of peril, while the curandera asks of him a sacrifice few men of the era know how to make, even for the sake of love.