Spain, 16th century. The beautiful Dona Sol inspired a deep passion in Hernani, banished from the kingdom. Unable to live without her, he defies the ban and finds her in secret. Several rivals threaten the idyll. She is to marry her uncle, Don Ruy Gomez, and is also loved by the young King of Spain himself, Don Carlos.

Harpagon, a miserly bourgeois, wishes to marry the young Mariane and marry his daughter Elise to Lord Anselme. He does not know that Cléante, his son, is in love with the young Mariane and that his daughter Elise loves a penniless young man, Valère, whom he has just hired as a steward.

This play by Henry de Montherland, takes place in 1517 and depicts the Cardinal de Cisneros, an authoritarian man approaching his end, regent of the throne of Spain oscillating between his desire for power and his tendency to inaction. Thinking himself invulnerable, he awaits the arrival of young Charles on the throne, but his beliefs will be shaken.

The widow Barny lives in Nazi-occupied France, looking after her half-Jewish daughter in a small village. When the Germans arrive, she decides to baptize her and chooses priest Léon Morin to do so. After spending some time with him, the relationship with her confessor turns into a confrontation with both God and her own repressed desire. 

It's the height of the Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union with the Communists launching a spy satellite that has the Free World leaders in a panic. Fears about the nature of the satellite force the United States to send an agent undercover behind the Iron Curtain to discover what the Soviets have learned. What he finds is the Communists have used the information acquired from their spy satellite to help them perfect a new and even more deadly nuclear weapon.

François and Victor sell hard candy at the fun fair. They also bring up Gisèle, a one-year-old child they found by the side of the road. Although the two men are often at each other's throats they are the best friends, getting on well with the other fairground people. But when they defend Lisa, the fortune teller's daughter against Dédé, a thug who pesters her, they provoke his anger. Dédé sets fire to the two friends' stand and they are forced to take the road.