Acting
After 10 years separation from his wife, a film director (Jean-Louis Trintignant), imagines he can make up with her by giving her a part in his next film, an adaptation of Tshekov's "Three Sisters". He goes location scouting and stays in Bex, a Spa near Lake Leman, together with the three actresses : Julie, his ex-wife (Delphine Seyrig), the mysterious Cecilia, that his producer wants him to take (Lea Massari), and Esther (Valérie Mairesse), a teenager. They all stay in an old decaying hotel. In this isolated mansion the four of them will fight but also discover each other.
In Lausanne, Léon is involved by accident with a small Leninist group and gets to know Léa, a dedicated activist and the group leader's mistress. The police keep a close watch on them and trouble is bound to follow.
In Paris, an Arab immigrant working as a projectionist becomes obsessed with a mysterious woman he sees on the cinema screen. Following a visit from a man claiming to be his uncle, his world begins to mirror a macabre and cyclical narrative.
A TV reporter and his assisstant go to a small Swiss village to do a programme with a reclusive scientist, an expert on world food shortages. During this time, an Italian immigrant worker is killed in a road crash and the reporter becomes involved in uncovering the truth about his death.
