While living an oppressive, provincial existence, Mattia Pascal learns that he has been mistakenly declared dead. Blessed with that rarest of opportunities - the chance to start an entirely new life - he moves to a new city under an assumed name, only to find this new "free" existence unbearable. Faking his own suicide, he returns to his hometown, where his wife has remarried and his job has been filled. Reduced to a sad walk-on part in his own life, the only role now left to him is that of the "late Mattia Pascal."