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Ciottoli is a journalist with absolutely no prospective for his career, with a lot of debts and a mobster that want him died. Unexpectedly he win the national lottery (almost Eur 2.5 Mln) and try to remain unanimous hiding the winner ticker into his typewriter. Ironically his director order to him to write an article on the mysterious winner. When he is back home he discovers all his furniture has been confiscate and will go on a public auction. He will try desperately to buy back the worthless typewriter while all his previous problems still follows him, especially the mobster...
Mario (Placido), an Italian American who manages a pizzeria in NYC, is charged with an assassination of a judge in Palermo. He leaves the States, comes back to Sicily and recruit Michele, his younger brother, for some help. Michele is a good guy not involved with the Mafia, that is trying to build his life on honesty and hard-working. Michele needs some money to give freedom to a prostitute he is in love, and Mario promise his help in change of an hands to set up his trap for the judge. Anyway Michele isn't made with the same "pasta" of Mario, he couldn't never be a real Mafioso and this causes many between the two brother and the Mafia. There is only a way for Mario to save his brother. A way that Mafia could like.
In the late 1970s and early 80s, assassinations in Sicily get the attention of Communist deputy, Pio La Torre, who appeals to General Carlo Alberto Dalla Chiesa to become prefect in Palermo and take on the Mafia. Dalla Chiesa approaches the job with the same focus and methods he used in hunting down the Red Brigade.
