De Sica, a popular star in the thirties, in this film of stark realism turned his camera on those for whom he had heretofore played the clown. The marital triangle, a comic staple of the White Telephone films, is now depicted in its grim inevitability as a symptom of the dissatisfaction and restlessness infecting the middle class. The mother of four-year-old Pricò runs off with her lover, leaving emotional and logistical chaos in her wake. A reconciliation at a family seaside vacation brings hope but ends tragically. The story is shown largely through the child's eyes, so that no one escapes judgment, least of all the woman who is trapped in an unfulfilling marriage. At the same time, as in Umberto D., the characters seem to be at the mercy of a society that panders to false desires and unfulfilled yearnings, trampling the young, like the elderly, in its wake.