Émile, a director, advises his shy young employee Jacques to adopt his own carefree attitude towards women ("one lost, ten found").

Émile takes under his wing Madeleine, the daughter of his old friend Célestin, when she arrives from the country; he offers her a place to stay and a job at his studio, and he starts to fall in love with her.

The author, who has a moderate taste for exceptional subjects, thinks, in effect, that making a film consecrated to the cinema is as dangerous as writing a play the heroes of which are comedians or a novel the main character of which is a novelist.

It would be fortunate, however, if the reader understood that, by prompting remembrances of the artisans who, between 1900 and 1910, gave birth, in France, to the first cinema industry in the world, their pupil wanted to render homage to their memory.

"[6] Clair acknowledged an influence on his own script from Molière's L'École des femmes, with its story of an older man's rivalry with a younger one for the affections of the same woman.

The effect was supposed to be that of sitting next to a friend who explained what was being said when necessary, but in the event audiences were put off by finding the same voice/character feature both within the action on-screen as well as commenting on it off-screen, which seemed to diminish credibility.

For example: "...film and audience most enjoy themselves when the action is confined to the studio with sets and all the paraphernalia of primitive film-making perpetually collapsing and a quartet of hands, strayed from some Gallic crazy gang, eternally playing cards...