Mauro, a judge, is worried about his older sister Marta, who took care of him since he was a boy, and now suffers from mental illness and suicidal thoughts. She seems to recover from her depression when Mauro acquaints her with Giovanni, a brilliant actor at the edge of legality. However, Mauro becomes unconsciously jealous of their relationship.

Four waiters and a cook working at a seaside restaurant hate one another but still keep working together for lack of better opportunities.

Michele is a young filmmaker frustrated by the lack of understanding his work receives and at odds with the film industry, especially a colleague making a musical on the '68 student protests. As he struggles to complete his own film about Freud's mother, Michele's insecurity and creative block manifest in a series of unsettling nightmares. Nanni Moretti's self-inquiry into cinema, political ennui, and men's relationships with their mothers.

Nanni Moretti recounts in his diary three slice-of-life stories marked by a dry, ironic gaze: in the first, he rides his Vespa through a deserted, sun-drenched summertime Rome; in the second, he visits a reclusive friend on an island, who ropes him into an impromptu journey between islets in search of quiet; and in the last, he finds himself grappling with an unknown illness.

Young Father Giulio returns to Rome, where he was born and raised, to replace a priest who has left the clergy to start a family. He is delighted to reunite with his loved ones, especially his mother, sister, and old friends. Once radical leftists like Giulio himself, the latter are now each coping in their own way with the defeat of the revolution. Soon, however, Giulio realizes that despite his best efforts, he seems unable to solve the problems troubling those around him.

Italy, early 80's. A political terrorist is being transferred northward from Sicily for a conjugal visit; during the journey, a police captain tries to make him cooperate.

Angela is a woman of thirty who lives in Milan, but decided to return to her native Calabria, where her father still lives. During the journey by car, she meets a very different girl from her, and younger, who is also called Angela.