The "adventures" of a group of teenagers in a suburb of Rome. Fifteen-year-old Lorenzo makes up a tall story about one of their friends who, according to him, is dying of cancer. The other kids, touched by the awful lot of their pal, decide to send a prostitute to his place so that he can sleep with a woman before kicking the bucket. Two years and a half later, the "vitelloni" have grown up but have they grown wiser?