Ettore Scola won the Prix de la Mise en scène at the 1976 Cannes Film Festival.

[1][2] The film tells the story of a large Apulian family living in an extremely poor shantytown of the periphery of Rome.

Four generations of his sons and relatives are cramped together in his shack, managing to get by mainly on thieving and whoring, among other things more or less respectable.

Giacinto refuses to share his money with anyone, and spends little of it on himself, preferring to hide it from his family, which he routinely abuses verbally and physically.

The film ends with Giacinto living in a newly built exceedingly crowded shack with both his mistress and his wife, together with an apparently reconciled family and the newcomers as well.