A lazy surveyor is thwarted by two women whose houses he is surveying for destruction to make way for a park. In another realm of the story, a man is given a hat by another man, who asks him to give his fiancé a gift. However, he mistakenly gives the gift to another girl entirely, and makes love to her.

Aleksey and Katerina separated twenty years ago. He left for the West, she stayed in the East. They will meet again in Switzerland under troubling circumstances.

A man is consumed by an increasingly all-consuming madness that drives him to identify with Adolf Hitler. His insanity pushes him to physically imitate the dictator, and even to build a bunker with the intention of spending the rest of his days there...

Criminals Rayner and Simon organize a diamond heist, but are outsmarted by Jean and Rémy, two aspiring crooks.

In 1940s France, a new teacher at a school for disruptive boys gives hope and inspiration.

An exhausted militant wants to take a break from the incessant frenzy surrounding him. His country’s dictatorship is on its last legs and chaos reigns. His wife Sylvie leaves their country for France. She writes about the new democracy struggling to be born back home. His daughter Joyce must hide out in the deserted childhood home in the solitude and infinity of the Black Beach. Several adversaries – the militia of a hazy regime in his native land and the Paris police – wage a strange game of chess in which he is the pawn. Threats abound and he’s haunted by his past, his fears, dead friends. He has three allies: his wife, his daughter, and an old girlfriend from his fighting days.

A young Swiss couple, Vincent and Françoise, plan to leave Geneva and settle in Africa: a friend of theirs living in Algeria promises to give them a job there.