Paolo Cioffa, as Christmas approaches, is ready to leave on a cruise with his mistress Magda Venni, freed by his wife Francesca Zanchi and his son Federico, who is about to go skiing.
Sicily, 1951. A young literature teacher secretly falls in love with Maria Venera, the most beautiful girl in town who lives in the decrepit palace of her grandfather, an old aristocrat who squandered his fortune.
