After the death of the paranoid emperor Tiberius, Caligula, his heir, seizes power and plunges the empire into a bloody spiral of madness and depravity.
The life of St. Francis of Assisi (1181-1226) as related by followers who gather after his death to tell stories so that Leone can record them: a privileged and virile youth, a prisoner of war, an heir who turns away from his father and gives all to the poor, a beggar for others, and an inspiration to friends who accept the Gospels' life of poverty.
In 1939, at a Paris café, six friends of various nationalities vow to meet again at the same spot after the end of WW2.
