Dr. Sukartono and his independent-minded wife, Tini, are facing marital problems when Rohaya the singer enters their life. Unlike Tini, who refuses to play the role of self-sacrificing wife, Rohaya is ready to become the devoted wife to Sukartono. On the surface, Shackles dissects the old romantic trope: the love triangle. But Shackles also illustrates the confusion experienced by many Indonesians of the pre-independence generation; they struggle to overcome problems stemming from their tradition-bound society, but in the end they realize that by changing into a new type of person that is neither Eastern nor Western, the situation might grow worse.