


Port of Marseille, France, recently liberated from the German yoke. Caught as stowaways aboard a ship, Manon, a young woman who was accused of collaborating with the Nazis, and Robert, a freedom fighter who saved her from reprisals, tell the captain about the many challenges they have had to face in order to survive.

Recently released from reform school, Élisa works at Madame Irma's before moving to Paris, where her success is growing. On a trip to the provinces, she meets Bernard, a blind man. They soon fall in love, but Élisa hides her activities from him. When he finds out, he hits her. The situation quickly degenerates.

From Bonaparte to Casanova, history is cast in the light of famous escapes from various European countries.

A home, a motorcar, servants, the latest fashions: the most eligible and most finicky bachelor in Paris offers them all to Gigi. But she, who's gone from girlish gawkishness to cultured glamour before our eyes, yearns for that wonderful something money can't buy.


Gervaise Macquart is a beautiful Parisian laundress and mother whose lover, Lantier, walks out on her. She eventually marries Henri Coupeau, a roofer who has an unfortunate accident. As her now crippled husband descends into alcoholism, Gervaise tries to make ends meet on her own. Life becomes even more complicated when Lantier returns and befriends Henri. Meanwhile, the man she really loves is sent to prison.

Near the end of World War II, General Dietrich von Choltitz receives orders to burn down Paris if it becomes clear the Allies are going to invade, or if he's unable to maintain control of the city. After much contemplation, Choltitz ignores orders, enraging the Germans and giving hope to various resistance factions that the city will be liberated. Choltitz, alongside Swedish diplomat Raoul Nordling, helps a leader organise his forces.

Betrayed by an informant, Philippe Gerbier finds himself trapped in a torturous Nazi prison camp. Though Gerbier escapes to rejoin the Resistance in occupied Marseilles, France, and exacts his revenge on the informant, he must continue a quiet, seemingly endless battle against the Nazis in an atmosphere of tension, paranoia and distrust.

In 1482 Paris, Frollo, Chief Justice of benevolent King Louis XI, becomes infatuated by the beauty of Esmeralda, a young Romani girl. The hunchback Quasimodo, Frollo's protégé and bell-ringer of Notre Dame, lives in peace among the bells in the heights of the immense cathedral until he's involved by the twisted magistrate in his malicious plans to free himself from Esmeralda's alleged spell, which he believes to be the Devil's work.

In the third and final episode of the trilogy, Fantômas imposes a head tax on the rich, threatening to kill those who do not comply.

A wealthy widow, Natercia, helps Alain, a poor young man, to put together the film he plans to make. They decide to pool their resources to make the project a reality. At the first screening, Natercia realizes that Alain no longer needs her.

Robert Langlois is now married to Catherine, the former housemaid. And they would live happily ever after if the housing crisis did not force them to live together with Gabrielle and Fernand, Robert's parents. For, despite the good will on either side, tension soon arises. What else to expect when there is too little space in their Montmartre apartment for four people (then for six then eight, the couple having... two pairs of twins!) ; the continued presence there of Fernand (who loves peace and quiet) after he is driven to retirement ; the difficult beginnings of Robert as a lawyer in a room of the apartment, etc... Other troubles follow and the harried family is on the verge of implosion...

Two unlikely companions must smuggle four suitcases filled with contraband pork across Nazi-occupied Paris.