A couple of bourgeois intellectuals, Carlo and Silvia are married for twenty years. But they wearily live their relationship separately; while she lives in their original flat in Rome, he lives with a young lover, Lù from time to time in his house in the country while writing a book. He does not keep his relationship hidden from his wife and even accepts that Silvia may have lovers, among them in particular a young and violent neo-fascist. But this relationship rekindles Carlo's jealousy and he becomes obsessed by knowing everything about her affairs and jealousy makes him blind. The film navigates between eroticism, decadence and perversion, in an obscure game with no wins or winners.
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.
Fred is a gambler and deep in debt. He owes crime boss Victor a lot of money and the time to pay has come. He decides to take a massive risk to refund his debts and agrees to kill a man. Fred knows he has to pay his debt and that the only way to do it is to carry out the hit arranged by Victor.
After three elderly men are bitten by spiders, everyone assumes that their deaths are tragic accidents. But at police headquarters in Paris, Inspector Adamsberg begins to suspect that the case is far more complex than first appears.
Prof. Henri Laborit uses the stories of the lives of three people to discuss behaviorist theories of survival, combat, rewards and punishment, and anxiety. René is a technical manager at a textile factory and must face the anxiety caused by corporate downsizing. Janine is a self-educated actress/stylist who learns that the wife of her lover is dying and must decide to let them reunite. Jean is a controversial career-climbing writer/politician at a crossroads in life.
Alice is the widow of a Jewish surgeon who helps the former diplomat Jerome smuggle Jews out of Austria to save them from the Nazis. The duo recruits Charles, a shoe manufacturer whose uncle is a Nazi sympathizer in the Vichy government. Charles and Alice become lovers when they are picked up in Paris by Nazi soldiers on a curfew violation.
Nicole, nurse in Grenoble, is raped one night by four men. Deeply scarred, emotionally and physically, she thinks she will never recover from the trauma. Following a friend's advice, she decides to file a lawsuit.