The Reckless Moment

Each evening, before saying their prayers, some children swallow their cod liver oil. One evening, the youngest child makes a daring request in his prayer. (Lost film.)

Lost film. A young man is kidnapped by his business competitors, but the jailer falls in love with the man she has to keep a prisoner.

A pianist about to flee from a duel receives a letter from a woman he cannot remember. As she tells the story of her lifelong love for him, he is forced to reinterpret his own past.

An American millionaire, who had always bad luck with women, bets that he can live without them for five years. But after four and a half years traveling around on his yacht, he rescues a lady from drowning in the English Channel.

In late 19th century France, the Countess Louise, wife of a wealthy general, sells the earrings her husband gave her on their wedding day to pay off her secret debts, then claims to have lost them. Her husband quickly learns of the deceit, which is the beginning of many tragic misunderstandings, all involving the earrings, the general, the countess, and her new lover, the Italian Baron Donati.

Three stories about the pleasure. The first one is about a man hiding his age behind a mask to keep going to balls and fancying women - pleasure and youth. Then comes the long tale of Mme Tellier taking her girls (whores) to the country for attending her niece's communion - pleasure and purity. And lastly, Jean the painter falling in love with his model - pleasure and death.

An all-knowing interlocutor guides us through a series of affairs in Vienna, 1900. A soldier meets an eager young lady of the evening. Later he has an affair with a young lady, who becomes a maid and does similarly with the young man of the house. The young man seduces a married woman. On and on, spinning on the gay carousel of life.

Evelyne, a woman of bourgeois origin, now reduced to dancing in a sleazy nightclub, is reunited with her first love, who has become a successful doctor.

A man's clumsy attempts to marry his young naive ward. Ophuls' idea was: show the Louis Jouvet theater troupe, which had decamped to Geneva, playing for an audience and show things like the actors getting made up, and going behind stage.

A country girl finds work as a chorus girl in Paris, gets embroiled with a bad egg, and then finds true love with a good-looking milkman.

Franz Ferdinand, heir to the throne of Austria-Hungary, is kept absent from the royal court due to his dangerous political ideas. Sent on a tour of inspections and inaugurations, he falls in love with Countess Sophie Chotek.

Lola Montes, previously a great adventuress, is reduced to being the attraction of a circus after having been the lover of various important men.

Vienna in the beginning of the twentieth century. Cavalry Lieutenant Fritz Lobheimer is about to end his affair with Baroness Eggerdorff when he meets the young Christine, the daughter of an opera violinist. Baron Eggerdorff however soon hears of his past misfortune...

Gaby is expelled from school after a married teacher commits suicide after telling her he can't live without her. Though she has done nothing, she is punished for his act.

Wide-eyed and poor young Leonora weds an obsessive millionaire named Ohlrig, but the marriage is loveless. Even worse, Ohlrig seems to have manic, violent tendencies. Eventually, young Leonora escapes her unhappy life and begins working with New York City doctor Larry Quinada, who she soon falls for. Unfortunately, Ohlrig refuses to grant his wife a divorce, and things get even darker for Leonora when she realizes she's pregnant with his child.

Respected banker Karel Brand is seen as a marketable emblem of probity. When he loses 350,000 guilders, his reputation is tarnished – without the respect attached to it, he loses his job. Brand becomes unemployable, and his creditors suddenly start calling in their debts. His young daughter Willy suffers the same fate.