The Posalaquaglia cousins are two small scammers and make a living of expedients: Dante receives as recognition for Tommaso a bill of one hundred thousand lire from the famous financier Bruscatelli, who ends up in prison immediately afterwards.

An evening at an Italian restaurant. Hosted by tolerant and relaxed Flora, various parties of middle-class people come in -- large and small, young and old, regulars and tourists, married and single -- to dine, converse, argue, celebrate, make confessions; to overhear other people's discussions, to interrupt them, to sing, listen to music, and enjoy life. The camera, just like the people, moves constantly from table to table, into the kitchen and the back room to observe the staff's petty jealousies and frustrations -- until two hours later it's time for everybody to go home.

A lecherous governor of Naples in 1680 lusts after the wives of several peasants, particularly after the miller's wife Carmela. The miller himself plans to avenge his honor by seducing the wife of the governor.

Teresa gets her first taste of crime -- and its consequences -- when, during World War II, she is nabbed for robbing an apartment. But being poor and perpetually starving, the pretty petty thief doesn't give up her quest for ill-gotten gains and soon turns to pick-pocketing. Despite her questionable thieving skills, the bumbling crook tries scheme after scheme, pilfering from strangers and dodging the law as she searches for a way to fund an adequate meal.

A police commissioner in a little town in the Italian Venetian province investigates a prostitution ring run by two pensioners; during his investigations he also learns that a former manicurist shacks up with ten students, the prefect's daughter prostitutes to keep her pimp, a famous doctor has sex with his young patients, a headmaster has his eyes on the pupils, a noblewoman organizes orgies in her villa, the local convent is run by a lesbian and his actual girlfriend poses for a hardcore magazine. He wants everything to come out in the open but his superiors try to put obstacles in his way.

A black comedy set in the 1960s in a small Netherlands community, populated by a cast of eccentrics, all of whom hold a range of sexual obsessions and frustrated desires.

How the mothers of a deprived suburb of Marseille will create a solidarity committee under the aegis of the parish priest. Gathered in assembly, they will invent a solution to the endemic misery of their city.

An old prince lives in his ancient palace in Rome together with the ghosts of his ancestors. For years he has proudly rejected huge offers by a real estate group seeking to buy the palace and build a department store in its place, but when he suddenly dies his nephew signs the deal. The palace seems lost, but the ghosts forge a plan to save it from destruction.

A Jewish pawnbroker, a victim of Nazi persecution, loses all faith in his fellow man until he realizes too late the tragedy of his actions.

Suave antiques dealer Alfredo Martelli is picked up by the police with no justification. At the precinct, Martelli realizes what the investigation is all about-- that he is the main suspect in the killing of his wealthy ex-lover. Is he guilty, or is he just a sleaze?

A man decides to cook for himself and finds a revolver (which may have belonged to John Dillinger) hidden in his kitchen.

Lisbon, 1938. Mr. Pereira is the editor of the culture section of an evening paper. Although fascism is on the rise in Europe, like in nearby civil war Spain or even inside Portugal itself in the form of Salazar's regime, Pereira only concerns himself with writing bios and translating French novels. Things change after he hires a young writer as his assistant, getting to know also his girlfriend – both opponents to the regime – and reluctantly helps them when they begin to get in trouble for subversive activities. Eventually, he's forced to take a stand...

Agnese has many men who woo her and live with her cousin Cesira, who has the opposite problem with men and wishes she would also have men woo her.

Alberto Nardi is a Roman businessman who fancies himself a man of great capabilities, but whose factory teeters perennially on the brink of catastrophe. Alberto is married to a rich and successful businesswoman from Milan, Elvira Almiraghi who has a no-nonsense attitude and barely tolerates the attempts of her husband to keep his factory afloat with her money.

Sussex, England, 1938. Shortly before the outbreak of World War II, Thomasina and Martha Hanbury, two ingenious sisters, create LOLA, a miraculous machine.

Bruno Stroszek is released from prison and warned to stop drinking. He has few skills and fewer expectations: with a glockenspiel and an accordion, he ekes out a living as a street musician. He befriends Eva, a prostitute down on her luck and they join his neighbor, Scheitz, an elderly eccentric, when he leaves Germany to live in Wisconsin.

A Sicilian woman is dishonored by her lover, then goes to London with a pistol intending to murder him.

When a veteran marshal is sent to a small town, he quickly falls for two women: a midwife and an earthy young woman nicknamed "Frisky".

Italy, 1916. Oreste Jacovacci and Giovanni Busacca are called, as all the Italian youths, to serve the army in the WWI. They both try in every way to avoid serving the army.

A spoiled rich woman and a brutish Communist deckhand become stranded alone on a desert island after venturing away from their cruise.