From Naples to Rio de Janeiro, the long life of Maria Imparato.

Maria Imparato grew up in a small and crowded house, with a mandarin tree right in the center of the courtyard. She has the hands of a seamstress, a mass of dark hair, the thin body of someone who has known the hunger and heat of Naples running through her veins. When she meets Tonino Balestrieri, the war has just ended and dreaming for her seems possible again: that handsome and elegant boy from a good family has her eyes only for her. To become her wife, Maria will have to challenge the ignorance of the people of the alleys and the prejudice of the uptown, and finally emigrate to Brazil, with an ocean to separate her from everything she loves. But misery always comes back to the surface, like the foam of the sea. In Rio de Janeiro, together with Tonino, Severina is waiting for her, very elegant and ruthless, a mother-in-law with snake eyes willing to do anything to chase her away. Maria knows that the future faces itself without fear, and she is willing to fight for her freedom. "If you have wounds you have to look inside" she says to herself, "because that's where beauty is." It will be her past that will give her the strength to move forward, to challenge fate and start once again. Her story goes through the twentieth century like a rebellious and tenacious wave, and she tells us about an exceptional life, made up of dreams, fatigue and passion.