Режиссёр Джованни «Нанни» Моретти ведёт дневник. В него он записывает события своей жизни. Вот он ездит по Риму на своём мопеде «Веспа», встречая римлян и туристов, вот он ездит по островам с другом, изучающим джойсовского «Улисса», подпадая под власть телевидения, вот рассказывает историю своей борьбы с раком лёгких. История в трёх главах – сама жизнь: курьёзная, комедийная, странная, грустная, страшная. И переходы от комедии к трагедии такие резкие, как извивы аттракциона «американские горки». Может быть, именно в них – всё очарование жизни в Вечном городе, на островах, под итальянским небом.
Michele is a Communist MP who loses his memory in a car crash—although nobody seems to notice it. During a water polo match ahead of election day, he starts to remember his past life, revealing the picture of a man whose personal and political identity crisis mirrors the one of Italian communism.
The film documents the trade union battle of the workers of the Apollon printing house in Rome, occupied for a few months after the management decided to fire all the personnel and sell the land on which the factory was standing. In the form of a docu-fiction, the events of the long occupation are reconstructed, which began on June 4, 1967 and ended in December 1968. The workers play themselves and various other roles, but they are also co-authors of the film, which is not a simple chronicle of events, but an analytical reading of the reality of the factory, the story of the conquest of instruments of struggle and democracy, with the indication of strategies of attack on the bosses' power. The narrative voice of Gian Maria Volonté gives continuity to the story and comments on the events.
