The story of a group of friends, all around 30, who live in the Le Panier district of Marseille, France. It's not a bad life, made up of slightly shady dealings, nights out, sun and just hanging out. But the neighborhood is an inescapable presence. Over a period of a few summer days, their carefree lives will plunge into a predictable tragedy.

Irénée has no desire to work in his uncle's grocery shop and dreams of becoming an actor. His opportunity comes when a crew of movie makers came to his little village. Irénée begins to go over the top in order to be noticed, which earns him the traditional joke reserved to a "Schpountz" (naive person): a phoney contract and a departure for Paris.

Lucie makes her living selling bathing costumes on the beach at Marseilles. She would like that her ten-year long boyfriend, Lucien, becomes her best friend. But this requires truth. For Lucien, newly made secret agent who has to play a young idler, it is mission impossible. Even more so when a young american beauty will ask him to initiate her into sensual pleasures.

Gerard has just lost his job and his marital life is falling apart. He accidentally falls off a bridge and meets Sarah who believes he wanted to commit suicide.

In a time of war and disease, a young officer gallantly tries to help a young woman find her husband.

The Three Wise Men – Balthazar, Melchior and Gaspard – are on their way to Bethlehem to pay homage to the infant Jesus when they are suddenly, an inexplicably, transported two thousand years into the future. They find themselves walking the streets of Paris, where they encounter a young woman called Macha who, they are convinced, will lead them to the newborn Messiah.

A young woman who has gone over to the wrong side of the law with her new boyfriend begins having second thoughts about both crime and her new romance in this drama. Helene is an attractive 18-year-old who has fallen for Paul, a 25-year-old drifter, and one evening as they're having drinks in a cafe in the North of France, Paul decides to rob the bank across the street. Though wary, Helene agrees to help, and soon the couple is 40,000 francs richer -- and on the run from the law. The two hop a train to Marseilles, but it isn't long before Helene begins to think the robbery was a bad idea -- and isn't certain if her relationship with Paul is such a good thing either. Paul, however, isn't troubled by any second thoughts, and is very certain about his feelings for Helene -- so much so that he forces a priest to marry them at gunpoint. This is only the most recent manifestation of Paul's volatile personality, and rather than binding Helene closer to him, it only drives her farther away.

Newly transferred to the bustling port city of Marseille to assist with a crackdown on organized crime, energetic young magistrate Pierre Michel is given a rapid-fire tutorial on the ins and outs of an out-of-control drug trade. Pierre's wildly ambitious mission is to take on the French Connection, a highly organized operation that controls the city's underground heroin economy and is overseen by the notorious —and reputedly untouchable— Gaetan Zampa. Fearless, determined and willing to go the distance, Pierre plunges into an underworld world of insane danger and ruthless criminals.

In Marseilles a skilled pizza delivery boy Daniel who drives a scooter finally has his dreams come true. He gets a taxi license. Caught by the police for a huge speed infraction, he will help Emilien, a loser inspector who can't drive, on the track of German bank robbers, so he doesn't lose his license and his dream job.