In a post-apocalyptic world, the residents of an apartment above the butcher shop receive an occasional delicacy of meat, something that is in low supply. A young man new in town falls in love with the butcher's daughter, which causes conflicts in her family, who need the young man for other business-related purposes.
France, World War II. In order to somehow make ends meet, the mother of two children, Marie Latour, does underground abortions and rents a room to a familiar prostitute. She doesn't pay any attention to her husband, who returned from the war because of his injury and lives her own life. Abortions gradually begin to bring a good income, and boredom can be easily dispelled by starting a young lover.
A former schoolteacher turned film distributor, Jean-Pierre Jackson made his directorial debut with this French comedy about two losers. When alimony payments catch up with Felix (Philippe Chevaillier), his furniture is seized. After a decade-long marriage, Raoul (Regis Laspales) leaves his wife. The two team for a job with Le Gai Vendangeur (The Jolly Vintner) as sales reps, but they score zero while tooling around Brittany in a silly station wagon decorated with an immense wine bottle atop the vehicle's roof. However, when they're joined by friendly, sexy Eliane (Cecile Bois), sales surge. The wine pours, and so does the money. Life is sweet, but it all turns sour when an affair begins between Felix and Eliane, much to Raoul's regret.
Prague, 1920. Milena's father wants her to follow in his footsteps and be one of the first female doctors in Czechoslovakia, but she is determined to be a writer. She elopes to Vienna with the Jewish music critic Ernst Pollak, and starts a correspondence with Franz Kafka. She leaves Pollak and returns to Prague with her father, where she befriends and translates Kafka. As a journalist, Milena covers the 1923 Ruhr worker's strike and meets the communist architect Jaromir.
