Here's the pragmatic approach that parents tell their children here - study the sciences because that will provide you a job. For Marta (Isabella Ragonese),even a top degree with honours in Philosophy fails to land her a permanent job, drawing some sharp contrast against peers who have dropped out of college, but steadily climbing the career ladder. The film has intent to examine the plight of permanent-temporary workers, you know, those who are under temporary contracts, but have to perform tasks and take on responsibilities just as how a regular staff would, but minus the staff perks.

I suppose companies take this approach with an eye wary on their bottom line, and sees this staffing strategy as something that's cost effective, virtually eliminating benefits from the payroll. The film might have been effective, with the introduction of unionist Giorgio (Valeno Mastandrea) who tries to understand the plight and conditions in the fictitious company Multiple (manufacturing who knows what product),but somehow lost its mission objectives midway because of a complication in matters of the heart, thereby relegating its own subplot.

This film is about the surreal journey of Marta as she tries her best to seek out a job, believing that her academic qualifications would open door. Contrary to her beliefs of course, Fate comes into play to introduce her to a single mom Sonia (Micaela Romazzotti) who works as a tele-marketer for Multiple, and recruits her into this really strange company with a very wide male-female division of the sexes, and feel-good ra-ra practices such as singing motivational songs at the start of each shift, and the receiving of cosmetic, encouraging SMSes in the morning everyday.

In other words, they operate much like a cult group, where performers get rewarded with dubious prizes, and laggards in the company get shipped out unceremoniously, with little dignity. Such is the sweat shop that Marta finds herself in, if not for her intellectual ability in internalizing the process in double quick time, and innovating in her job so as to perform with moderate inputs. For those who have worked in companies, or amongst peers who require you to jump, sing, shout, dance out loud in celebration of your employment or to serve as a mental prep booster before you commence each day, this film would definitely ring a bell.

And while the narrative might seem all over the place, it is precisely how director Paolo Virzi coaxes a coherent and at times zany story out of the multiple events, and myriad of characters. There's Daniela (Sabrina Ferilli) the floor supervisor who's a control freak, and harbours the hots for CEO Claudio (Massimo Ghini) who on the surface is the typical all- caring boss with a finger on the company's pulse. Then there's the romantic knot that Marta inadvertently gets herself into, and fellow sales partner Lucio 2 (Elio Germano) who preps himself almost all the time to think that he's the best of the best.

Throw in plenty of song and dance, self-reflection moments, gratuitous sex and nudity, changing relationships, and you have a film that tries too hard to cover a wide spectrum of ideas, but end up missing the bullseye more often than not. The film has its moments, but nothing too memorable besides those song and dance numbers that make the Beach Boys and some folk songs hip again.

Little prepares Marta, a recent graduate student looking for a meaningful job in Rome, for her encounter in the Metro with Lara, a young girl with glasses that stands next to her and hands her one of those pieces of paper from an ad for a roommate. Imagine her surprise when she goes to find out the room that was being offered in Sonia's apartment. Sonia also happens to be Lara's mother. As the price is negotiated, Sonia asks for help with Lara, who is about five, but with a mind of a much older person.

Sonia is instrumental in taking Marta to the place where she works part time as a telemarketer. The company employs a large number of young women whose job is to call unsuspecting households, specially women, to offer a number of useless products. Marta's job is to convince the person whom she talks to make an appointment for an expert to visit them, who will try to sell them all kinds of home worthless improvement products, a clear profit for the company.

In the process of getting proficient in marketing, Marta keeps working on her own work, which consists in writing essays about subjects that interest her, hoping to sell them to different publications. Daniela, is in charge of the women. All the shifts start with a sort of choreography which serve as a sort of pep talk for the group. Marta soon realizes not everything is legitimate in the company. As a way to help her establish a point of contact, Marta looks the location of the home of the person she is trying to sell a service by looking it up on line. She makes an impression on an older and lonely woman, Signora Franca, whose daughter has died not too long ago. This lady keeps calling her back at odd times just to talk.

There is an interest to organize the labor by Giorgio, a union representative that wants to point out how the women are mistreated and abused. Daniela likes to pretend she is the love interest of Claudio, the president of the company, when he really has no intention of ever marrying her. In fact, one night, Daniela shows she might be a lesbian in the closet when she invites Marta to her place with the excuse of a small party, but it is only the young woman she is interested in entertaining and perhaps seducing.

Paolo Virzi gives this film a quick pace that, at times, makes the viewer dizzy, in a fun way, because the action never lets up. Supposedly, the original material was a novel by Michela Murgia, and Mr. Virzi wrote the adaptation with Francesco Bruni. First of all, the film takes a serious look at the world of telemarketing in a satirical way that works well within the story. These pesky women on the other side of the phone call one receive are well trained to sell whatever the companies they represent is peddling. The company in the film is the Italian branch of an American concern with all its catchy ways to motivate their workers.

Isabella Ragonese surprises with her take on Marta. In fact, she is one of the main reasons for watching the film. Marta has no experience in what she does, but she learns to be the best until she realizes there is something rotten at the core of the company. Sabrina Ferilli makes a wonderful Daniela, the bitchy woman that wants more production from the women under her. Micaela Ramazzotti plays Sonia with panache showing her charms with generosity, for she is a free spirit. Others in supporting roles are Valerio Mastandrea, Elio Germano and Massimo Ghini. The narration is provided by Laura Morante.

Nicola Pecorini photographs the film in its ultra modern setting with an eye to contemporary values. Paolo Virzi whose previous work we have enjoyed tremendously, shows he is a voice to be reckoned with in the Italian cinema.

Preamble for you foreign viewers: this movie is about the so called "permatemps"; that's temporary workers who effectively do the job of a permanent worker, but can be fired anytime and have no benefits at all. In the last 5-6 years in Italy, temporary job laws were introduced and had a devastating effect on society, especially on younger generations.

Finally a movie with heart about temporary workers, very well written and directed. You will be taken through the odyssey of Marta, a young graduate in philosophy who cannot find any job related to her studies, so to keep herself alive, she has to take a temporary job as a telephone-marketer.

While in the process of descending this inferno, she will get in touch with a wide spectrum of persons and situations, that will keep you interested in the story.

The writer/director does a very good job in building the story, you will really care for all the characters, even the two villains, who by the end of the movie show their human side.

My only remark to the script is when Marta engages in a totally gratuitous sex act that is very clichè, and the fact that the story does not really tackle with all the problems that a temporary worker has to face in Italy, mainly the inability to get any mortgage to buy a house, or the mandatory periods of time when the worker is left home without pay and then hired again later through a different mediating agency, which is the standard workaround to avoid the rather feeble restrictions imposed by the law.

Overall, this is a great movie that I recommend, it is an universal story about the de-humanization of people, that every viewer in the western world will feel connected to. Yet it still manages to be funny at times and rather moving.