Plot Summary

Cesira is a beautiful widow and a successful grocery-store owner in Rome. WWII is raging, and she fears for her beloved daughter, 13-year-old Rosetta, amid the daily bombings. They travel to the village where Cesira was born, where she believes they will be safer, and they're happy there, even as food dwindles. A young intellectual, Michele, falls in love with Cesira, who is too consumed with their survival and her daughter's well-being to return his timid advances. As the Allies advance, Cesira decides to return to Rome--and encounter the horrors of war at last.