Though generally successful, L'Uomo di Paglia (A Man of Straw) is hampered by two of director Pietro Germi's most characteristic creative shortcomings: overlength and oversimplification. Germi himself plays the leading role, a young husband and father named Andrea Zaccardi. When he falls in love with another woman (Franca Bettoja), Zaccardi begins to neglect his family. Things get worse when his emotionally unstable mistress commits suicide. Though his wife and son forgive him, Zaccardi somehow knows that his life has forever been altered, and that neither he nor his family will ever truly be happy again.