Two linen fabric dealers with their shops close to one another, battle against each other for more and more costumers. Umberto constantly loses clients because of the tough competition brought by Leone, who offers the best prices in the neighborhood. But they leave differences aside when the rise of Fascism places Anti-Semitic politics which rigidly control business like the one conducted by the Jewish Leone, and those new regulations are viewed by Umberto as completely unfair. The long rivalry soon becomes a great friendship.

A London aristocrat (Rupert Everett) rents out rooms in his posh estate to a pair of Italians who are wooing two wealthy British gals (Elle Macpherson, Judith Godrèche).

A man enters a restaurant in Trastevere, in the suburbs of Rome, and asks the owner to cook him the superb bass he has just been given. He wants it served at the dinner gathering like every year the group of inseparable friends he is a member of. The others join him. The last to come is a lawyer who has just liquidated the succession of the one that will be missing tonight. The deceased leaves them an estate in Umbria provided they live there in community. What will the friends decide during this dinner like no other?