Tourneur's first film tells the story of a chemist, Jules Renaudin. He welcomes a young pregnant girl, Claire, who enters his pharmacy in despair one evening. He takes care of her and gradually falls in love with her, doing everything for her. But she is attracted by the cheerfulness of young Jean Cordier, whose warehouse is a few steps away from the pharmacy.

In the tenement slums of Paris between the world wars, impoverished street singer Albert yearns for beautiful Romanian immigrant Pola. Pola's boyfriend, local hoodlum Fred, grows jealous of Albert's constant attention to his woman and frames the hapless musician for one of his own petty crimes. But while Albert is in prison for Fred's misdeed, Pola ends up falling for Albert's faithful best friend, Louis.

Three men vie for a pretty young lady in a small Spanish port town: The boss of a dance hall who encourages her aspirations at performing, a married fisherman, and that man's unmarried younger brother.