A veterinary student abandon his studies after his parents are killed and join a traveling circus as their vet.
After his parents' death, Jacob Jankowski is left penniless and homeless. Events lead him to joining the circus as their vet, working under their untable boss August whose violent tendencies give everyone reason to be cautious around him, including his beautiful and quiet wife Marlena, whom August is very possessive of and who Jacob finds himself soon falling in love with.

film adaptation of Sara Gruen 's novel of the same name , tells the during the Great Depression is a flow of the story of the circus . " Elephants " from "I Am Legend , " (I Am Legend) , the director Francis Lawrence (Francis Lawrence ) directed the film script , adapted by Richard LaGravenese . The story begins with an over 90 - year - old elderly during the Great Depression of life Remembrance , when he came to a second-rate circus take on odd jobs and take care of animals , he witnessed all kinds of abuse of circus animals behavior, and unknowingly fell in love with the wife of a brutal trainer .