A group of French soldiers, including the patrician Captain de Boeldieu and the working-class Lieutenant Maréchal, grapple with their own class differences after being captured and held in a World War I German prison camp. When the men are transferred to a high-security fortress, they must concoct a plan to escape beneath the watchful eye of aristocratic German officer von Rauffenstein, who has formed an unexpected bond with de Boeldieu.

Professor Louis Delage is a kidney transplant specialist. He is so good in his field that his peers nickname him the "great man". But one day, one of his patients die during surgery and Delage starts doubting. Is he actually such a great man? To fight desperation he decides to take in the deceased child while devoting more time to Florence, his hitherto neglected wife.

Alexandre Dumas' romantic novel Lady of the Camelias (more popularly known as Camille) was filmed twice in 1953, first in Argentina, then in France. The Argentine film was heavily modernized, while the French version returns to Dumas' 19th-century milieu. Micheline Presle is excellent as Marguerite, the gorgeous courtesan who flits from man to man until she finds true love in the form of the much-younger Armand (Rolande Alexandre). Though he is willing to marry her despite her past, she is persuaded to forsake him, lest his reputation be ruined. The story then wends its way towards its famous tragic finale, as the consumptive Marguerite is permitted a few brief moments of happiness before her flame is permanently extinguished. Advertised as the seventh version of the Dumas classic, La Dame aux Camelias was certainly not the last.

While vacationing in St. Moritz, a British couple receive a clue to an imminent assassination attempt, only to learn that their daughter has been kidnapped to keep them quiet.

Three friends leave their village for a retirement home travelling the countryside

Remy Germain is a doctor in a French town who becomes the focus of a vicious smear campaign, as letters accusing him of having an affair and performing unlawful abortions are mailed to village leaders. The mysterious writer, who signs each letter as "Le Corbeau" (The Raven) soon targets the whole town, exposing everyone's dark secrets.

César runs a bar along Marseilles' port, assisted by his 23-year-old son, Marius. Friends since childhood, Fanny and Marius love each other, but Marius has a secret wanderlust: every ship's whistle stirs a longing for foreign lands. When M. Panisse seeks Fanny's hand in marriage and when a departing clipper needs a deckhand, Marius and Fanny must decide who and what they love most. César, with his generous, wise spirit, tries to guide his son.

Soon after Marius's departure, Fanny learns that she is pregnant with his child, to the disappointment of her mother and of Marius's father, César. To secure a better life for her unborn child, she accepts a marriage proposal from the aging widower Honoré Panisse.

The life of Vincent de Paul, the 17th-century author and priest who founded two religious orders.

Leaping forward twenty years, the trilogy continues with the death of Fanny's husband, Panisse, and the discovery of her secret by her son, Césariot. The young man resolves to track down his biological father, Marius, whose life has been fraught with calamity and poverty.