During World War 2 the Germans arrested people at random off the streets of Paris and in retaliation to sabotage by the resistance announced the execution of one in ten prisoners. Chosen as one of the victims, lawyer Chavel trades his place with another man in return for all his possessions. At the end of the war he returns to his house and tries to integrate himself with the family of the man who traded places with him, all the while hiding his true identity. However matters are complicated when a stranger arrives claiming to be Chavel.
After a wizard's spell goes awry, 12th-century Gallic knight Godefroy de Papincourt, Count of Montmirail finds himself transported to 1993, along with his dimwitted servant, Jacquouille la Fripouille. Startled and perplexed by modern technology, the duo run amok, destroying cars and causing chaos until they meet Beatrice de Montmirail, an aristocratic descendant of the nobleman, who may be able to help them get back to 1123.
In 1945, as World War Two comes to a close, five small time crooks unite to form a gang. After several bold robberies they become notorious as "the front-wheel drive gang". The police attempt to stop their crime spree with little success, but how long will their luck last?
A young man goes looking for work on a cold, rainy weekday morning in Paris. He buys an umbrella for one franc and finds happiness with a beautiful dancer, who seeks shelter under his umbrella in the rain.
French philosopher Denis Diderot produces the first encyclopedia while indulging in 18th-century decadence.
In this conventional, broadly comic farce of greed and royal matrimony, nearly bankrupt businessman Victor Harris is marrying Maria-Helena, a princess who comes with a dowry that is made up of one half of her island kingdom. Her father, the cowardly King Arnold III is counting on the money this marriage will bring him. The country is now almost bankrupt because of the king's gambling debts. As Harris and the king look forward to their illusory profits from the royal merger, other characters add some liveliness to the otherwise predictable story.
The cynical boss of a big insurance agency invites his top-salary employees to spend a week-end in his country house. A modest clerical worker, also invited, discovers the hidden reason for this party - and decides to take advantage of it.
A former hero of the French anti-Nazi resistance is approached by old comrades to lead a financially struggling liberal newspaper. Initially reluctant, she takes on the challenge, mortgaging her house to keep it afloat. As conservative forces intensify their opposition, she is eventually forced to sell the paper, seeing it as a personal failure.
Nicole, nurse in Grenoble, is raped one night by four men. Deeply scarred, emotionally and physically, she thinks she will never recover from the trauma. Following a friend's advice, she decides to file a lawsuit.
An upstanding provincial reporter becomes presenter of the TV news on a commercial network owned by an influential Italian businessman. He soon outgrows his family and neglects them terribly. Investigating a fascist terrorist cell, the reporter's integrity is called into doubt by the police. Soon after, his jealous wife unleashes her wrath live in TV. It goes from bad to worse until his wife's anger brings him back to his senses and back home.
Pauline intends to end her days and meticulously prepares her suicide, but she meets Peppo, an Italian immigrant, who will change her mind.
Herbie, the Volkswagen Beetle with a mind of its own, is racing in the Monte Carlo Rally. But thieves have hidden a cache of stolen diamonds in Herbie's gas tank, and are now trying to get them back.
In 18th century France, Marquise de Merteuil asks her ex-lover Vicomte de Valmont to seduce the future wife of another ex-lover of hers in return for one last night with her. Yet things don’t go as planned.
Complex and more cerebral than a wartime action-thriller, this espionage drama focuses on the relationship of two former buddies who were fencing masters before the war and in love with the same woman. Now Delancourt (Bernard Giraudeau) is apparently living a good life managing a gym in a Paris hotel under Nazi control, where he meets his former friend Pierre (Christophe Malavoy), who is on a secret assignment to mislead the Nazis on the date of the Normandie invasion. Pierre, alias Augustin, cannot figure out if Delancourt is a real resistance fighter or if he is a double agent. Circumstances create a larger and larger gap between the former friends while the plot goes through several twists and turns before Pierre's doubts are resolved.
In 1830s France, pianist/composer Frédéric Chopin is pursued romantically by the determined, individualistic woman who uses the name George Sand.
French Postcards rings both comic and true. The believable, fresh-faced characters are young naives from American colleges spending their French-English dictionaries, they compulsively seek out hundreds of monuments, romanticize the nomadic artist's life, and look for grown-up love. The French tutor them well, as befits their reputation. Jean Rochefort is the harassed headmaster with a hankering for affairs, and Marie-France Pisier is his very sexy wife. Watch for a newcomer named Debra Winger, and another-Mandy Patinkin.
1957. For several months, Henri Charlègue, the ex-director of the newspaper "Alger democratic", banned, has been living in hiding. Suspected of belonging to the FLN, he is actively sought by paratroopers.
In medieval France, young lawyer Richard Courtois leaves Paris for the simpler life in the country. However, he is soon drawn into amorous and political intrigues. At the same time, he is pushed to defend a pig, owned by the mysterious gypsy Samira. The pig has been arrested for the murder of a young boy.
Prague, 1920. Milena's father wants her to follow in his footsteps and be one of the first female doctors in Czechoslovakia, but she is determined to be a writer. She elopes to Vienna with the Jewish music critic Ernst Pollak, and starts a correspondence with Franz Kafka. She leaves Pollak and returns to Prague with her father, where she befriends and translates Kafka. As a journalist, Milena covers the 1923 Ruhr worker's strike and meets the communist architect Jaromir.