The story is the harried attempt of a Sicilian partisan, as part of the risorgimento, to reach Garibaldi's headquarters in Northern Italy, and to petition the revered revolutionary to rescue part of his besieged land. Along the way, the peasant hero encounters many colorful Italians, differing in class and age, and holding political opinions of every type. There is a key train scene, and the film ends on the battlefield, Italian unification a success, despite brutal losses.

When she is in jail to defend her colleague, the secretary Anna Alessandri finds out that her man got engaged to another woman.

A woman struggles to make a living after her husband is mistakenly presumed dead.

A couple having an affair strike a bicyclist with their car and do not offer aid out of fear of their relationship being exposed.

Father Lebonnard, a former watchmaker who made a fortune, remains simple while his wife is only dreaming of worldly affairs and pushes his son Freddy to marry Bianca, the daughter of the Marquis de Rocafort, their neighbor. She feeds a similar project for her daughter Mariella.

Caesar, a senior French colonist returned home after many years of absence, knows a girl, Marcella, who is in full depression because she was abandoned by her lover. Caesar welcomes her into his home and surrounds her with paternal attention so that he can quickly forget the past. Slowly his feeling turns into a love that Marcella seems to reciprocate. However, when Cesare realizes that the girl feels only gratitude for him and is in love with a younger man, he loses control. Blinded by jealousy, he plans to kill Marcella's lover but, in the face of the girl's vulgarity and indifference, he realizes that he has been teased and turns his anger towards her.

When her sweetheart Bruno joins the Italian army, Gina, bored by her lack of social life, weds Tullio. She comes to regret her decision when Tullio proves to be a Nazi collaborationist. Casting her lot with the Resistance movement, Gina is forced into a difficult decision when the safety of ex-lover Bruno is endangered by the treachery of Tullio.