The time is the late 1920s, and Angelo and Tonino are two brothers traveling around the country in a rattle-trap truck, showing moving pictures to any group of people willing to pay. When they arrive in the region of Emilia-Romagna, Angelo strikes up a relationship with a wealthy marchesa connected to the fascist movement. Tonino, on the other hand, starts to follow the rebellious Giovanni, locked up for his anti-fascist stance, and the farmers who have joined in the anti-fascist forces. As the rebels are either murdered or put in prison, Tonino becomes more and more commited to their cause - especially after Giovanni is killed. When a silent movie on the condemned and dying Christ is shown on the brothers' screen, Tonino stops the action to project some slides he has taken that show who murdered Giovanni - in an action that calls for his brother and the rest of the bystanders to finally make a decision on where to place their loyalties.

Love blossoms between crusader Bradamante—a woman knight wearing an invincible suit of armor—and Moorish prince Ruggero. But a sorceress predicts to Bradamante her beloved will die in battle at the hand of fellow Christian paladin Rolando, whom in turn is in love with Isabella, Ruggero's sister.

Thirty years after the disappearance of her father, a university professor who was targeted by radicals in the '70s, a woman discovers a way to communicate with her past self and tries to prevent the tragedy that marred the life of her family, but she learns that not everything was as she thought.

Palermo, Sicily, 1984. Examining magistrate Giovanni Falcone allies with Tomasso Buscetta, a former mobster, to defeat the clan of Corleone, the ruthless Mafia faction that rules Cosa Nostra with an iron hand, cruelly eliminating all those who dare to oppose its immense power: other criminals, policemen, judges, even innocent civilians. One of them wants revenge, the other wants justice. But only one can survive such an unequal fight.

During a debate in Naples' town hall in the early 1980s, Pasquale Picone, a former steel-worker who has recently lost his job, sets himself on fire in front of the Municipal Council.