Set in a rural area of France in the 19th century, this simple tale tells the story of a servant girl whose life seems marked by grand tragedy, but whose heart is simple and uncomplicated enough not only to endure, but even to attain serenity in the face of her manifold frustrations. Her only friend, to whom she pours out all her troubles, is an old parrot. When the parrot dies, she reverently has it stuffed and continues telling it her woes. This drama is based on a story by Gustave Flaubert.

1936. In a village in the Bassa Padana, a beautiful and shapely forty-year-old girl is aunt of some boys in the middle of their sexual maturity.

Refusing an arranged marriage, young aristocrat Carmela is sent to a convent. Her arrival intensifies the power struggle between the debauched nun Elizabeth, and the stern but evil Mother Superior, as both are smitten by Carmela's beauty.

A group of young desperados is hunted for several years by a determined bank guard

The wise and experienced maestro in the arts of love imparting his knowledge and techniques to a younger man before he dies.

Annabella marries Soranzo. She happens to also be pregnant by Giovanni — who also happens to be her brother. Destiny, and jealousies threaten to expose her past, and Soranzo plots revenge.

Bubu leaves his job in a bakery, forces his girl-friend into prostitution, and from then on lives out of the money she makes. The young couple find their place in the world of prostitutes and pimps, but the lack of perspective in their life - which is permanently haunted by the possibility of an incurable and fatal venereal infection - and the humiliations the girl endures strain their relationship and lead to conflicts.