Originally commissioned by Truffaut as part of a series of short films based on Edgar Allen Poe's Tales of the Grotesque and Arabesque, it would be a way for New Wave directors to sponsor younger directors. This was the only film in the series completed.

Serge Mouret is a frail and devout young priest in a tough country parish. When he falls down and loses his memory, he is nursed back to health by Albine, the beautiful carefree niece of the outspoken atheist Jeanbernat. After Serge and Albine fall in love, Serge recovers his memory and realizes the grave sin he has committed.

In a deliberately erratic and disjointed fashion, this film follows the adventures of Bernard (Jean-Pierre Leaud). A young man from the provinces, he makes his pilgrimage to Paris and seeks adventure while living on a barge.

A group of educators led by Fernand Deligny are working to create contact with autistic children in a hamlet of the Cevennes.

Jean Lerat begins his military service at an army camp. Despite his aunt’s attempts to pull a few strings to his advantage, the unfortunate Lerat manages to get on the wrong side of his bullying colonel…

Ordered to seduce French captain and steal from him classified papers, Mata Hari, an exotic dancer and a spy, instead falls in love with him and blows the cover.

As the city of Paris and the French people grow in consumer culture, a housewife living in a high-rise apartment with her husband and two children takes to prostitution to help pay the bills.

Stanislas Previne is a young sociologist, preparing a thesis on criminal women. He chooses Camille Bliss as his subject of study and begins to visit her in prison for interviews. Camille became acquainted with trouble at a young age and justifies her actions by "fate-bets." She is currently in prison for allegedly murdering one of her lovers. As she tells Stanislas of her life and love affairs, his interest in her grows to more than just professional. Can he resist her charm?

A young man with magical powers journeys to his uncle to request help in fighting his sorcerer father.

A young woman joins a theatrical troupe where she slowly believes that the director is involved with a secret group and that he is in grave danger.

A WWI veteran decides to build a memorial to all of the people who have mattered to him but are now dead.

A tobacco planter on Réunion island in the Indian Ocean becomes engaged through correspondence to a woman he does not know. The woman that comes does not look like the picture he got, but he marries her anyway.

A group of young boys have a collective crush on Bernadette. As a result of this, they have an unreasoning jealousy of Gérard, and do everything they can to disrupt their relationship. When Gérard catches one of the young boys spying on them, he thrashes him severely. In retaliation, the children try to inspire Bernadette to doubt Gérard’s love.

Sabine vows to give up married lovers, and is determined to find a good husband. Her best friend Clarisse introduces her to her cousin Edmond, a busy lawyer from Paris. Sabine pursues Edmond, with the encouragement of Clarisse, but Edmond does not seem very interested.

Adèle Hugo, daughter of renowned French writer Victor Hugo, falls in love with British soldier Albert Pinson while living in exile off the coast of England. Though he spurns her affections, she follows him to Nova Scotia and takes on the alias of Adèle Lewly. Albert continues to reject her, but she remains obsessive in her quest to win him over.

At the beginning of the 20th century, Claude Roc, a young middle-class Frenchman, befriends Ann, an Englishwoman. While spending time in England with Ann’s family, Claude falls in love with her sister Muriel, but both families lay down a year-long separation without contact before they may marry.

In 1798, a feral boy is discovered outside the town of Aveyron, France. Diagnosed as mentally impaired, he is relegated to an asylum. A young doctor named Jean Itard becomes convinced that the boy has normal mental capacity, but that his development was hindered by lack of contact with society. He brings the boy home and begins an arduous attempt at education over several years.

Antoine is now 30, working as a proofreader and getting divorced from his wife. It's the first "no-fault" divorce in France and a media circus erupts, dredging up Antoine's past. Indecisive about his new love with a store clerk, he impulsively takes off with an old flame.

Claude Massoulier is murdered while hunting at the same place as Julien Vercel, an estate agent who knew him and whose fingerprints are found on Massoulier's car. As the police discover that Marie-Christine Vercel, Julien's wife, was Massoulier's mistress, Julien is the prime suspect. But his secretary, Barbara Becker, while not quite convinced he is innocent, defends him and leads her private investigations.

Madame Jouve, the narrator, tells the tragedy of Bernard and Mathilde. Bernard was living happily with his wife Arlette and his son Thomas. One day, a couple, Philippe and Mathilde Bauchard, moves into the next house. This is the accidental reunion of Bernard and Mathilde, who had a passionate love affair years ago. The relationship revives... A somber study of human feelings.