One stormy evening in 1829, the aging writer René de Chateaubriand, takes refuge in a mountain retreat at Cauterets, a small town in the Pyrenees. Here, he meets Léontine de Villeneuve, an aristocratic woman forty years his junior, who ignites his passion and who seems to be as equally attracted to him. Under the watchful gaze of the maître d'hôtel, Chateaubriand embarks on what will be his last great love affair, with a woman he will later refer to in his writings as L'Occitanienne.
Terrorist Paul Mansart, imprisoned in a maximum security prison, overcomes initial reluctance and agrees to experiment in “virtual reality” in order to restore the identity of the mysterious criminal who prepared the assassination attempt that cost Paul his arrest and, possibly, a number of recent terrorist attacks in Europe.
A man who had everything taken away from him, including his family, by his brother teams up with a young card player in order to take revenge on the brother.
Jim is the drummer for the great black musician Billy Swann. With him, he plays in a club called San Sebastián, owned by his friend Floro, every summer.
Staubli is happy. He has just concluded a considerable deal with El Farik, one of his biggest successes as an arms dealer. To sign his final contract, Staubli takes the plane with Loussif, Serge Tournier and his wife Laura. During a stopover, a mechanical incident immobilizes the group for a few days in the Moroccan desert. Then Tom arrives, a pilot who trades with his old plane, the Sphinx. A small business that works well. But among these particular customers, Laura strangely reminds him of the one who left him and because of whom he left everything before...
In order to escape from her former lover Marc, Sylvia goes to Brazil where Dr. Santamo transforms her into the beautiful Emmanuelle...
Henri Savin has managed a trucking company for his lover, Dominique Montlaur, for many years. Now he is planning to leave her for Julie Manet, the woman he has made pregnant, and Dominique is hysterical. She first threatens suicide, then shows up at a meeting of Savin and Julie. Dominique tries everything she can think of to break Savin and Julie apart, to no avail. Frustrated in her efforts, she jumps off a cliff and dies. Savin insists that he and Julie lie to the police about the encounter, although Dominique's death was a suicide and therefore they had no direct hand in it. Detective Waldeck investigates Dominique's death.
Paris, France, 1942, during the Nazi occupation. Robert Klein, a successful art dealer who benefits from the misfortunes of those who are ruthlessly persecuted, discovers by chance that there is another Robert Klein, apparently a Jewish man; someone with whom he could be mistakenly identified, something dangerous in such harsh times.
Various experiences of childhood are seen in several sequences that take place in the small town of Thiers, France. Vignettes include a boy's awakening interest in girls, couples double-dating at the movies, brothers giving their friend a haircut, a boy dealing with an abusive home life, a baby and a cat sitting by an open window, a child telling a dirty joke, and a boy who develops a crush on his friend's mother.
France, 1893. Joseph Bouvier attempts to shoot his love who refused to marry him and to commit suicide. Upon release from the filthy asylum where he was placed, with bullets still remaining in his head, he wanders the country roads and rapes and murders many teenagers over years. The judge Rousseau captures him, but to serve his ambition seeks to avoid that Bouvier is simply declared insane.