Two lovers talking on a beach in France. One hides the fact that he is in need of a heart transplant. He knows that someone has to die so that he may live. But to find out who it was that died so that he may live.
On the day that his son fails his baccalaureate, Michel loses his job. He has been employed at the same factory for twenty years and now he has no job, no qualifications, no prospects. Michel soon realises that the only way he is going to get another job is by first passing his baccalaureate. So, he goes back to school, with his friend Gérard, who is in the same position. Naturally, Michel’s son is not at all pleased to find himself in the same class as his dad...
In 1960, Juliette, Antoine, Marie-Claire and Carlo are second class. They age of the first discoveries of the adult world, the first existential questions and the first stirrings of love. Beaufort teacher practice unconventional methods of education for the time and opens their eyes to what awaits. Serge's brother Anthony must return to America. Despair Antoine, Juliette, 15, falls madly in love with Serge, who is ten years older than her. But the Algeria war breaks out and Serge is called upon to defend his country. The young couple promises to write. Months pass and Juliet, pregnant, no news of the future dad ...
Marie, who works as a successful door-to-door encyclopedia salesperson, has been married to her husband Francois for 12 years and has a two-year-old son. Though she is relatively content with her life, she feels something is wanting. Enter 50-year old African-American Bill. Initially she is annoyed by his insouciance, but she finds that she is irresistibly attracted to him. Soon the two are in the midst of sordid illicit affair. She knows little about her new lover, and he seems uninterested in learning about her, but the long sessions of lovemaking are something else entirely. Feeling out of control, Marie is increasingly repelled by her own actions. Psychologically, she struggles to reconcile her torrid encounters with Bill and mundane domestic chores such as bathing her son. Moreover, she finds herself incapable of hiding her adulterous behavior, rather she comes home with scratches and hickeys all over her body, to the devastation Francois.
Lucien Hastier, known as "Lulu", is a locksmith in La Courneuve and a communist activist. He had never known his parents and had been raised by the public assistance, a notary comes to announce that his father died and left him an extraordinary inheritance: a castle, a title of duke and a royal filiation. But problems arise, the deceased duke has left heavy debts and suitors to the title.