Dimitri Kirsanoff

Les Berceaux is about the dedicated sailors who venture out into the deepest ocean, and the wives who must await their return. The woman sits in her living room, gently rocking her infant’s cradle as she sings, the movement mimicking the rolling motion of the ocean waves. Many men will lose their lives to the ocean’s vast waters, but the juxtaposition of death and life (in the cradle) suggests an endless and noble cycle. Kirsanoff imaginatively places a rear-projection screen outside the woman’s window, through which, as she sings, we can watch the ocean waves lapping up against the shore, or the ship charging majestically over the water. Also worth noting is that the film was photographed by Boris Kaufman, who later also shot On the Waterfront (1954) and 12 Angry Men (1957). —Shortcutcinema.blogspot.pt

The story closes in Paris in January 1871, at the height of the siege, and introduces the main character, Monsieur Morissot, a watchmaker who has enrolled in the National Guard. Morissot, who is bored, hungry, and depressed, is walking along the boulevard when by chance he bumps into an old friend, Monsieur Sauvage, with whom he used to go fishing before the war. The two old friends reminisce over several glasses of absinthe in a café;, talking wistfully of the pleasant Sunday afternoons they used to spend fishing on the banks of the Seine before the war. Tipsy from the absinthe, the friends, for want of anything else to do, decide to go fishing in their old spot, and having obtained a laissez-passer from their officer, walk along the river to Argenteuil, a few miles west of the city, in the no man's land between the French and Prussian lines.

Hans has killed the dog of Firmin, a shepherd. Wild with rage, Firmin kidnaps Elsi, Hans' fiancée and locks her up at his home. Hans, a peddler, vows to find the missing girl. This is what he does and he manages, with the help of Mânu, the village idiot, to give Elsi a letter. On seeing her, the changeling falls in love at first sight with the young woman. Elsi soon realizes that Mânu can become her instrument of vengeance.

A pair of sisters leave the country for the city after their parents are slaughtered in a mysterious axe murder.

Jacques Montet, a successful crime story writer, has already written a hundred books and would like to call it quits now to devote himself to loftier writing. But his wife, a cold-hearted, money-minded, bossy woman won't allow. All the more as she is the one who supplies Jacques with the plots of his detective stories. When Jacques, yearning for true love, meets young, pretty Muriel, he can't stand the situation any longer. Fortunately - for him - the plot of the 101st detective story imagined by his wife is about a ... perfect crime. He simply has to follow her instructions to ... get rid of her. Everything goes according to plan until Jacques discovers a scary detail: the presence of a mysterious witness on the scene of the crime.

A singer tries to rescue a man drawn into the drug trade.

During a stopover, Morel, an airline pilot and Colette spin the perfect love. She hides from him that she is compromised in the actions of a band of criminals. She manages to escape her dangerous friends while a shootout wipes them all out.

At Christmastime, the love affairs of five clothing models working for Pierre Roussel, a renowned Paris fashion designer. Marlène hesitates between two suitors. Blanche, who loves Jean, Roussel's son, wants him to talk to his father about their relationship. Catherine learns that her lover has a wife and two kids. Jeannette throws herself into the arms of an Oriental prince. In despair the fifth one attempts to commit suicide...