Acting
A high school in the thirties: most of the students are leaving for the Easter holidays. However, one of them,Brassier, an A -student ,stays for sentimental reasons. He is desperately in love with the principal's wife who does not want to cheat on her husband, and, above all, does not want the young man to ruin his good prospects. On a night he calls on her, a theft is committed, in the principal's office. Although completely innocent, the good lad stands accused. He's got an alibi, but it would compromise the reputation of the woman he is in love with.
An adventurer tries to seize oil deposits in Mongolia .
Little Germaine Valcour, an adulterine child, is abandoned and taken in by a showman, Father Ballot. She becomes the consolation of the good man whose daughter has gone wrong. Madame Vaulcour died of grief while her lover, after many bad blows, takes justice into his own hands. The girl stays with her adoptive parents.
RĂ©my (Robert Lynen), a stolen child is adopted by a wandering singer. With him and his trained animals, RĂ©my travels the roads of France. But his adoptive father dies and Remy, who has knowledge of a boy who knows something of his history, sails for England to find his mother.
In 1914, during the First World War, the rich chatelaine de Boissière, with a sulphurous past, took in Jean le Barois, a young soldier lost in territory occupied by the Germans, who was none other than the son of the man she loved, then ruined. The young man, after having despised her, falls madly in love with the woman who pushed his father to suicide.
Thanks to a bit of string-pulling by his aunt, Jean du Bois d'Ombelles, a young recruit who has blue blood in his veins, hopes to go through a nice and comfortable military service. Unfortunately he becomes Corporal Bourrache's pet aversion. Nevertheless, against all expectations, Jean ends up taking a liking for military life.
During the First World War, before joining a squadron at the front in 1918, Herbillon (Jean-Pierre Aumont) has a liaison with Helene (Annabella), a married woman. The young man discovers that his mistress is none other than the wife of Maury (Charles Vanel), an aviator friend.
Due to financial problems, the boarding-school of Saint-Loup is on the verge of closing its doors. In desperation, Jacquelin, the headmaster, has the idea to invite former students to a fund-raising reunion. Among the alumni, three men whose common point is to have been in love at the time with the headmaster's niece. One is a banker, the second a priest and the last one a globetrotter. All of a sudden, the peace of the assembly is disturbed: Jacquelin's niece has just been murdered.
Fates of multiple otherwise disconnected characters intertwine miraculously under the sky of Paris. And it all happens in one day.
In a settlement in the northern mining country. The Marles, Bréhard and Gohelle families wake up and prepare for a new day at work. The young engineer Larzac, newly appointed to the mine, will soon oppose the authoritarian and conservative methods of his superior Dubard. Georges Gohelle would like to marry Marie Bréhard, but housing difficulties thwart their plans. Brezza, a Polish immigrant, who must return to his country, would like to hate his marriage to Louise Gohelle. Roger, Marie's little brother, has just turned 14. He does not want to go down to the mine as his elders have always done. He will however have to resign himself to it. Marles evokes for him the social struggles of 1906. Roger is injured during a landslide. In front of his family and his friend Marles, who had come to the hospital, he announced his decision to continue his profession. Larzac, invited to the Marles, reveals that he refused a quiet position at the Charbonnages de Paris. He too stays.
In a college, three friends form a secret society. Their objective - going to America. One night, after one of their secret meetings, one of them sees a man coming out from a wall. The next day, after he talks about it, he disappears. Then, the second one vanishes. Are they gone to their dreams? That's when the art teacher is murdered. Suspicions now are too high so the third one decides to investigate.
A young noblewoman regrets having to marry the village ironmaster for money reasons, but later comes to appreciate her new husband.
Separated by an ancestral hatred, two small villages of the South see their infant population engaging in war, while the teacher of the first village and the mayor of the second love each other.
Endive-Meunier, a prosperous silk dealer from Lyon has an affair with his secretary he tries hard to keep secret. One day, he nevertheless accepts to accompany her to the seaside resort of Coeur-sur-Mer. Unfortunately for him, once there, he finds himself in the presence of Claudius Paquito, the popular barman of a fashionable club. The trouble is that the man is no other than one of his former employees he once fired for insolence...
The Count of Kerlor, to chastise his wife whom he believes to be unfaithful, entrusts his son to a couple of scoundrels. When he repents and wants to find the child, the carnies make their nephew sick. But the other little boy, in search of his comrade, is recognized by his reconciled parents.
Life story of a charming scoundrel, with little dialogue other than the star/director's witty narration. As a boy, only he survives a family tragedy when he's deprived of supper (poisonous mushrooms!) for stealing...concluding that dishonesty pays. Through years of dabbling in crime and amusing adventures, two women appear and reappear in his life, a dazzling blonde jewel thief and a stunning brunette gambler. Finally, he meets the mysterious Charbonnier who had saved his life in World War I, leading to the surprising next phase in his career...
L'Ange rouge is a cabaret run by a former mobster with his friend, a singer and dancer he brought back from Argentina. A fleeing gangster takes refuge in the cabaret. The singer and the gangster have an affair.
After being left for another man by his wife, Charles Bellanger raises his only son to fear and suspect women. Years later, such an education is bearing fruit.
Abandoned children, left to their own devices and a life of danger, are adopted by a kind man.
Gaston, an artist in love with an upper class English girl, accepts to stay away from her when a wealthy rival offers to pay her father's heavy debt. Broken-hearted, he leaves for France with his young servant. They join a young girl as popular musicians and tour the countryside in their way to Paris, where his former love reappears.
