In an adaptation of a novel by Natalia Ginzburg, Monicelli subjects a bourgeois family, tradition bound and so in advance stages of decay, to the anarchic energy of a child of the sixties. The free-spirited Mara-portrayed by Mariangela Melato with the same patented mile-a-minute delivery she effected in Swept Away-has been impregnated by the family's only son, and gives birth while he's off getting killed in a political demonstration. Will the family's only heir be a little bourgeois or a zany individualist like his mother? With Delphine Seyrig as the family matriarch, Aurore Clement as her daughter, and Lou Castel as a ubiquitous family friend, "Monicelli's direction manages just the right balance of implied social criticism and an almost affectionate understanding for the victims of changing times. A rarity among his Italian confreres, Monicelli has a compassionate way of looking at (and not down on) his humans." (Variety)