La Strada (1954) tells the story of the relationship between an innocent young woman and a brutal strongman. The title is translated as The Road. The cast includes: Giuletta Masina (as Gelsomina), Anthony Quinn (as Zampano), and Richard Basehart (as The Fool).

The story and screenplay were written by Federico Fellini, Ennio Flaiano, and Tullio Pinelli. Dialogue was by Tullio Pinelli. Editing was by Leo Cattozzo. Photography was by Otello Martelli. The music was composed by Nino Rota. The film was produced by Dino De Laurentiis and Carlo Ponti, and directed by Federico Fellini.

As the film begins, Gelsomina (Giuletta Masina) is walking along the beach. Her mother calls her to meet Zampano (Anthony Quinn), a traveling circus performer, who had previously worked with her sister, Rosa, who is now dead. Gelsomina’s family is so impoverished that her mother sells her to Zampano, after he pays ten thousand lira.

Gelsomina is quiet and obedient, but is heartbroken by the news of the death of her sister. She is apparently mentally disabled, and submits passively to her mother’s instructions.

Zampano is tall, rough, and bad-mannered. He takes her away on his motorbike, a vehicle which is mounted by a covered shed. Gelsomina rides in the back of the shed.

Zampano drives the motorbike along the road, and they come to a town where he performs several feats of strength before a small crowd, in exchange for money. He wraps an iron chain around his chest, and then bursts open the chain by inflating his chest.

Gelsomina is childlike, naïve, and innocent. She is trusting of others, and is mentally unprepared to defend herself. Zampano gives her a bowler hat to wear, and tries to teach her to play the trumpet. She cannot play the trumpet, so instead he teaches her to play the drum.

He beats her with a stick, so that she will obey him, and later he rapes her. Her feelings toward him are ambivalent. She feels sad, because she has been abused and mistreated. But pathetically, she feels happy because he wants her.

Gelsomina plays the drum, while Zampano performs for the crowd in the street. She wears the make-up of a clown, while Zampano tells the crowd that she is his wife.

She initially feels that he cares about her, and does not realize that he is using her for his own selfish reasons. She waits for him, while he flirts and makes love with another woman. She feels that she belongs to him, and does not think of leaving him.

They travel along the road to another town. She is dressed as a clown, and plays with the children who gather around her after she performs with Zampano. But she becomes dejected when he will not teach her to play the trumpet. She leaves him, and walks alone down the road.

She comes to another town, where there is a religious festival. The night of the festival, an acrobat walks across a high-wire over the street. Later, as she sits alone in the street, Zampano finds her, and forces her to get on his motorbike.

They join a circus, where she becomes a friend of the acrobat (Richard Basehart) who had performed on the high-wire in the town. The acrobat is also a jester, or fool. He makes fun of Zampano, who gets angry.

The Fool plays a sad melody on a toy violin. He teaches Gelsomina to play the trumpet, and she later plays a song on the trumpet. It is a sad, haunting melody that reveals a depth of expression and feeling that has until now been suppressed.

The Fool gets into a fight with Zampano, who grabs a knife and chases him into a tavern. Zampano is then arrested by the police, and the circus leaves town.

Gelsomina waits for Zampano in front of the jail. When he is released, she seeks some assurance from him that he really cares about her. But Zampano refuses to acknowledge that he has any need for her.

Zampano is brutal, cruel, and heartless. He and the Fool have been fired from their jobs by the circus manager. He and Gelsomina meet the Fool as they leave town.

The Fool has bought a car, which has broken down on the road. Zampano and the Fool get into a fight, and when Zampano punches him, the acrobat falls, hitting his head on the car, and is accidentally killed. Zampano then dumps the dead body under a bridge, and pushes the car down the embankment near the bridge, to make the scene look like an accident.

Gelsomina is distraught by her friend’s untimely death. She sleeps on the ground, even though it is cold and frost-covered, and Zampano realizes that she is no longer useful to him. He puts some money in her hand as she is sleeping, and leaves the trumpet beside her, before he drives away.

The scene changes to summer, and Zampano is performing with the circus again. The performers have stopped in a town, and Zampano hears a young woman singing a song, the melody that Gelsomina had played on her trumpet.

Zampano asks the young woman where she learned the song, and she says that a girl who had lived in the town four or five years ago had played the song on her trumpet. The girl was a vagabond, who had died after getting a fever. The girl had never talked, and no one in the town knew her name. Zampano is deeply affected by this unexpected news of Gelsomina’s death.

That night, he gets into a drunken brawl, and shouts 'I need no one!’ He feels guilty about how he mistreated Gelsomina. As the film ends, he walks down a deserted street, and then collapses in anguish. He lays on the sand of a beach, and is finally repentant and weeping, as he realizes how alone he is.

Giuletta Massina’s performance as Gelsomina has a radiant poignancy. She resembles Chaplin in her role as a tragic clown. She wears a bowler hat, and a long overcoat. She converses frequently by pantomime. She portrays a charming innocence and absent-mindedness. She is both joyful and forlorn.

The film shows how innocence can be destroyed by a corrupt society. The ending of the film shows that society must inevitably face significant consequences for its oppression and mistreatment of the innocent, the poor, and the powerless.