In 1942, the southern part of France is not yet occupied by the Nazis, but administrated by the collaborating French government in Vichy. A Parisian Jewish family flees to this "Free Zone" in Charente, where an old farmer gives them shelter. But when the Germans invade the Free Zone, their lives are at stake again.

The story of boys who were condemned to the severe reformatory regime in a French penal ‘colony’. It’s run by a former prison warden, based on ‘rehabilitattion’ trough manual labor and strict discipline. Young Reynard, a novice to crime and juvenile detention, meets horrible hardened villains and sadistic staff as well as people with some heart among fellow inmates and their supposed educators.

A star is born in a time of both celebration and instability in this historical drama with music from director Christophe Barratier. In the spring of 1936, Paris is in a state of uncertainty; while the rise of the Third Reich in Germany worries many, a leftist union-oriented candidate, Léon Blum, has been voted into power, and organized labor is feeling its new power by standing up to management.