Returning to themes he first explored in La strada (1954), Fellini crafts a parable on the whisperings of this spirit that just madmen and vagabonds are capable of hearing. The odd bunch, Ivo Salvini (Benigni), a bogus inspector of wells, and also Gonnella (Villaggio), also a former prefect, wander through the emilia romagna countryside of Fellini's youth and detect a dystopia of tv commercials, fascism, beauty pageants, rock music, Catholicism, along with Hindu ritual.