Europa '51 (1952)

Claudio is a construction worker living in the outskirts of Rome. He's happily married and his wife is pregnant with their third child. However, a dramatic event comes to upset this simple and happy life.

An aspiring young writer tracks a literary titan suffering from writers block to his refuge in rural Italy and learns about life and love from the irascible genius and his daughters.

A young woman in early-1900s Italy searches for a mystical sanctuary where her stillborn child can be brought back to life long enough to be baptized.

In late 1940s Italy, a mother makes the difficult decision to send her son to the north, where he catches glimpses of a new life away from poverty.

From childhood to fatherhood, Piero learns things the hard way while growing up in a working-class neighborhood of Livorno.

Unemployed Antonio is elated when he finally finds work hanging posters around war-torn Rome. However on his first day, his bicycle—essential to his work—gets stolen. His job is doomed unless he can find the thief. With the help of his son, Antonio combs the city, becoming desperate for justice.

Retreating from life after a tragedy, a man questions the universe by writing to Love, Time and Death. Receiving unexpected answers, he begins to see how these things interlock and how even loss can reveal moments of meaning and beauty.

The young priest Father Giulio returns to Rome, his hometown, after a long pilgrimage. Don Giulio hopes to live peacefully with his family and his friends, but discovers that many of them are depressed or frustrated, and some suicidal.

The story of three women searching for more potent, meaningful lives. Each is alive at a different time and place, all are linked by their yearnings and their fears. Their stories intertwine, and finally come together in a surprising, transcendent moment of shared recognition.

An alcoholic ex-football player drinks his days away, having failed to come to terms with his sexuality and his real feelings for his football buddy who died after an ambiguous accident. His wife is crucified by her desperation to make him desire her: but he resists the affections of his wife. His reunion with his father—who is dying of cancer—jogs a host of memories and revelations for both father and son.