Naples. Present day. Giovanna, a combative 60-year-old social worker on the frontline of the daily war against pervasive criminality, is confronted, like a modern Antigone, with a moral dilemma that threatens to destroy her work and her life. Giovanna runs an after-school centre that takes care of underprivileged children; a grassroots alternative to the mafia dominance of the city. But one day, young Maria, wife of a ruthless Camorra criminal on the run, and her two children take refuge at the centre, and ask Giovanna for protection.

A social worker dedicates himself to the recovery of children who have dropped out of school in the streets of Naples thanks to the circus arts. His work, however, is not well received by the families of the neighborhood and the courage of these children, with their stilts and their red noses, will clash with the harsh reality.