In 1957 Trieste, a few months before the general ban on brothels, inexperienced country girl Mimma becomes Paprika to finance her useless boyfriend as a prostitute. Amid the hustle and bustle of Rome, Paprika drifts from one brothel to another as she learns the ropes and works her way up one client at a time. However, as Paprika embarks on a stormy journey of self-discovery and sexual liberation, the sense that something is missing haunts her. Is Paprika meant to experience a passionate romance and solve the great mystery of true love?

In the large industrial port of an Italian city - sailors, women, black market traffickers, sleazy nightclubs, and dingy narrow alleys make up a world of danger, where a young American girl vanishes without a trace while an Italian man tries to track her down. On the way, he encounters a strange group of characters: a beautiful and ambitious prostitute, a girl ravaged by drugs, and the ferocious Joe Nerescu who is battling against a rival gang so he can gain control of the port.

Gianni is a political man with a good career waiting for him. Angela is his wife and she fakes an assault and a rape in a cinema. Eva is Gianni's lover and Angela's friend. Gianni and Eva decide to use the pretext of the assault to kill Angela. Later on Angela is blackmailed by a man who was present at her act. In the background there are Rosy, her maid always present, and a puzzling man who appears and disappears and makes strange phone calls.

A film from 1990.

A young policewoman slowly goes insane while tracking down an elusive serial rapist/killer through Italy when she herself becomes a victim of the brutal man's obsession.