Marie-Thérèse is firmly involved in a charity dedicated to the rehabilitation of prostitutes. She approaches Marcelle who, for the love of Pierre, an honest painter, hides her dishonorable profession, and she befriends Maria, in love with the gentle René. Marcelle's aunt is murdered, and her daughter arrested. Marie-Thérèse sets out to prove her innocence, but the two boys learn all about the two unfortunate women. Pierre is unforgiving. Happier, Maria will start a new life with René.
Petrus, a Montmartre photographer, is accidentally wounded by Migo, a dancer at the Frou Frou night club, when she is trying to shoot her faithless lover Rodrigue, a counterfeiter. Though Petrus tries to reconcile the lovers, Migo lands up with him after Rodrigue is finally killed by another jealous dancer.
Russia, 1835. Lieutenant Hermann, a compulsive gambler, is fascinated by an infallible martingale held by Countess Tomski, nicknamed The Queen of Spades. The day Hermann wants to wring the secret from her, the countess dies of fear. Following this tragic scene, Hermann sinks into dementia. Luckily, Lisa, his frail lover, brings him back to life and happiness.
Arsène Lupin decides to run a detective agency in addition to being a gentleman thief. As a detective he happens to cooperate with police in order to unveil the criminal activities of a villain. When he succeeds the villain returns the favour. The unmasked Arsène Lupin manages to escape with the villain's gangster moll as his new companion.
A pilot on one of the air mail flights between France and its African colonies has a brief romance with his distressed cousin before he returns to the call of duty, and the rebels in the desert.
Michel Levasseur is a joyous reveler who does not care about the next day. So much so that one day a bailiff bursts into his Paris apartment and seizes his furniture on behalf of Raymond Sauvaget, his landlord, a rich food industrialist. But far from resenting Sauvaget's act of hostility, Michel ... becomes his friend. Now Raymond, although prosperous, does not know how to handle women. That is why he asks Michel, a regular Casanova, to give him lessons in seduction.
Claude, son of a ruined family, pretends to be a dangerous trickster in order to get credit from the guys in the middle. He is in charge of retrieving compromising letters from a woman whose lover fears blackmail. But before arriving there, Claude fortunately meets love.
Jacques de Nisson, a rich man, has a new mistress, Lucie Cavelier. Which does not prevent him from courting Florence, the wife of his lawyer friend Forestier. One day, Jacques is found murdered and chief-inspector Candély is sent on the spot to investigate. Jean, the victim's butler, Lucie as well as Florence are suspected in turns but the real murderer is finally identified thanks to his fingerprints.
An exploration —manipulated and staged— of life in Las Hurdes, in the province of Cáceres, in Extremadura, Spain, as it was in 1932. Insalubrity, misery and lack of opportunities provoke the emigration of young people and the solitude of those who remain in the desolation of one of the poorest and least developed Spanish regions at that time. (Silent short, voiced in 1937 and 1996.)