Cochu, a peasant, is the whipping boy of his regimental comrades. He is called "buffer of the capiston", that is to say the captain's order. But he finds himself in the service of Hortense, the captain's sister.

When Nadia, his unfaithful mistress, breaks up with him, Patrick Lambert decides to kill himself. But before he reaches the point of no return he is stopped in the act by Camille, a burglar who has just broken into his house. Thanks to him and also to Rosita, Camille's girlfriend who falls for him, Patrick forgets his gloomy thoughts. It is the beginning of a series of crazy misunderstandings and adventures.

The Jacques Brothers, their temporary replacements, Yves Gérard and his troupe, as well as a famous movie star looking for a new partner, Evelyne Dorsey, are causing disruption at the "La Rose rouge" cabaret, the most famous cellar in Saint-Germain-des-Prés, to the delight of regulars.

Léon, a humble civil servant, has the unusual ability to walk through walls, however thick they are. One day, he falls madly in love with a charming hotel thief by the name of Suzan.

The brother of Jeanne Masson, a young nightclub singer, has been murdered by Brasier, a criminal who pretends to be a respectable man. Jeanne has resolved to avenge her brother but she just cannot take action herself. The way she finds is to ask police detective Pierre Leblanc to help her do it. Pierre gives his agreement and starts following the trail. He soon finds out that Brasier belongs to a gang whose boss, Cortedani, has ordered the murder.

The war will separate the members of the Valon family, two sons Alexandre and Antoine being prisoners, while the youngest Gilbert enters the secret army. Only their sister, Denise, will stay on the farm with her grandfather and grandmother. The Germans invade the free zone.

Schomberg, an enigmatic psychiatrist runs a nursing home. He is forced to close his clinic and disappear to escape the police. But he wants revenge on his wife's lover, Didier Laurent, a former RAF fighter pilot. Didier meets a young trapeze artist, Paula, with whom he falls in love. The happiness of the two young people is disturbed by the assassination of Irene, strangled by Schomberg who casts suspicion on Didier. Fortunately for them Commissioner Ulysses knows the truth and forces Schomberg to commit suicide.

The ordeal of Françoise who, deceived by her husband, sees her dying child. After a few events in the backdrop of a festival, the husband returns, she pushes him away, driving him to suicide. Another man she thinks she loves is already married.

In spite of his failures as a peddler, Casimir guaranteed his fiance that this time the vacuum cleaners will work for good. But he's still unsuccessful until he go to the appartment of Paul-Andre, a painter who was engaged by correspondence to a rich south-American woman. That's exactly when she arrive armed with a gun infuriated after she had received a rupture letter from the man she had never seen. She mistakenly took Casimir as her painter lover. Casimir his ready to flee until he learned she owned many hotels, a thousand rooms in fact. "A thousand rooms, a thousand vacuum cleaners", he suddenly think.