After working thirty years as a dedicated civil servant, Umberto Domenico Ferrari lives solely off a meager Italian government pension. While most pensioners decry the small amount of money from the government, most are unlike Umberto who is in debt, the pension unable to pay off those debts and provide a healthy life for him. He is all alone in the world with no family. His only friends are his dog, a mutt named Flike, and Maria, the young, single maid who works in the house in which he's rented a room for twenty years. Umberto is close to being evicted by his haughty landlady, Olga, for rent not paid, she who has ulterior motives for wanting him out beyond the money. He has until the end of the month to come up with 15.000 lire for current and back rent or be evicted. Maria cannot help him, she who has her own secret which she confides to him, that issue which threatens her own position in the house. So Umberto does whatever he can either to raise the money, which is primarily through selling whatever of his possessions are worth anything monetarily, or cutting back on other expenses. One way he is able to achieve the latter is to parlay off of a case of tonsillitis. Through the process of this basic survival, Umberto will have to make some difficult and often heart wrenching decisions.—Huggo