Mai 1940. Juifs, communistes ou opposants au nazisme sont internés au camp des Milles, près d'Aix-en-Provence. Le commandant Perrochon dirige ce camp d'une main de fer. Mais pourtant, quand l'arrivée des nazis est annoncée, il ne peut se résoudre à leur livrer ses prisonniers et affrète secrètement un train pour les évacuer sur Bayonne.
The film begins with a voiceover describing the trench warfare situation of World War I up to 1916. In a château, General Georges Broulard (Adolphe Menjou), a member of the French General Staff, asks his subordinate, the ambitious General Mireau (George Macready), to send his division on a suicide mission to take a well-defended German position called the "Anthill." Mireau initially refuses, citing the impossibility of success and the danger to his beloved soldiers, but when Broulard mentions a potential promotion, Mireau quickly convinces himself the attack will succeed.
The film is set in the Kurdish refugee camp on the Iraqi-Turkish border on the eve of the US invasion of Iraq. Thirteen-year-old Satellite (Soran Ebrahim) is known for his installation of dishes and antennae (for local villages who are looking for news of Saddam Hussein) and for his limited knowledge of English. He is the dynamic, but manipulative leader of the children, organizing the dangerous but necessary sweeping and clearing of the minefields. Many of these children are injured one way or the other, yet still maintain a boisterous prattle whenever possible, devoted to their work in spite of the vagaries of their life.
In Paris during the German occupation, an ill-assorted group of resistance fighters commits disorganized attacks. Missak Manouchian, an Armenian exile, is ready to help but is reluctant to kill; for him, being ready to die but not to kill is an ethical matter. However, circumstances lead him to abandon his reluctance. Under his leadership, the group structures and plans its actions and thus the Manouchian network is born. The film traces the story of this group, from its shaping to the execution of its members in 1944.
En 1954 à Alger, le Front de libération nationale (FLN) diffuse son premier communiqué : son but est l'indépendance nationale vis-à-vis de la France, et la restauration de l'État algérien. Ali la Pointe propose des parties de bonneteau. Repéré par la police, il s'enfuit mais se fait agresser par un passant, il réplique et se fait tabasser par le reste du groupe. Rattrapé par la police, il se fait arrêter. Emprisonné, il assiste par la fenêtre de sa cellule à l'exécution d'une peine de mort par guillotine sur un nationaliste. Le FLN le contacte.
En 1954, au début de la guerre d'Algérie, deux hommes, que tout oppose, sont contraints de fuir à travers les crêtes de l’Atlas saharien d'Algérie. Au cœur d’un hiver glacial, Daru, instituteur reclus, doit escorter Mohamed, un paysan accusé du meurtre de son cousin. Poursuivis par des villageois réclamant la loi du sang et par des colons revanchards, les deux hommes se révoltent. Ensemble, ils vont lutter pour retrouver leur liberté.
The film is set in southwest France in 1962. François (Gaël Morel), a shy young man from the lower middle class, is working towards his high school diploma. He spends most of his time talking about movies and literature with his best friend, Maïté (Élodie Bouchez), whose mother Mme Alvarez (Michèle Moretti) is François's French teacher. Mme Alvarez and Maïté are communists. At the boarding school, François becomes acquainted with the sensual son of a farmer, Serge (Stéphane Rideau). At night, he joins François in the dormitory to chat. Finally, Serge draws François into an erotic relationship.
Philippe Gerbier (Lino Ventura), the head of a Resistance network, is arrested by Vichy French police, imprisoned in a camp, and transported to Paris for questioning. He makes a daring escape.
Charles Plumpick (Bates) is a kilt-wearing Scottish soldier who is sent by his commanding officer to disarm a bomb placed in the town square by the retreating Germans.
The last two surviving members of a French Foreign Legion detachment, who know each other as Smith and Brown, are consigned to a grain pit in the desert to die slowly. As they await death the two soldiers eventually realize that they were childhood friends, John Geste (Ralph Forbes) and Otis Madison (Lester Vail), respectively.
Ce film retrace l'histoire de la vie de Lucie Aubrac pendant la résistance à l'occupation nazie, dont un "coup d'éclat" réussi... l'organisation d'un commando pour faire évader son mari Raymond Aubrac.
After an affair with a young woman named Sylvia the Frenchman Pierre Martel leaves Paris and goes to Algeria because he wants to start over. His wife refuses to follow him. Dismayed about all this he decides to join the French Foreign Legion. As a soldier he runs into a look-alike of Sylvia.
L'histoire de huit journées de guerre. En mai 1954, durant la guerre d'Indochine, la 317e section locale supplétive composée de quatre Français et de quarante-et-un Laotiens reçoit l'ordre d'abandonner le petit poste isolé de Luong Ba à la frontière du Laos, pour rallier une colonne partie au secours du camp retranché de Diên Biên Phu.
During the First World War, two French aviators, aristocratic Captain de Boeldieu (Pierre Fresnay) and working-class Lieutenant Maréchal (Jean Gabin), embark on a flight to examine the site of a blurred spot on photos from an earlier air reconnaissance mission. They are shot down by a German aviator and aristocrat, Rittmeister von Rauffenstein (Erich von Stroheim). Von Rauffenstein, upon returning to base, sends a subordinate to find out if the aviators are officers and, if so, to invite them to lunch. During the meal, von Rauffenstein and de Boeldieu discover they have mutual acquaintances—a depiction of the familiarity, if not solidarity, within the upper classes that crosses national boundaries.