| Director | Pierre Granier-Deferre |
|---|
A cause of death of someone named Bouin is given as heart failure.
Julien Bouin is a retired typesetter who keeps copies of his work, mostly newspapers, in his basement. He has long since fallen out of love with his wife Clémence, a circus trapeze artist who had to stop working when she fell during a performance. Flashbacks show them courting and eventually moving into the home where they still live in Courbevoie, formerly a pretty suburb of Paris, now in decline and gradually being demolished. Further flashbacks show the events that led them to them no longer speaking at all but only communicating by passing notes.
Julien takes in a stray cat. It being the only one on whom he bestows his affection, the cat becomes the object of Clémence's annoyance and growing jealousy. She takes a knife and cuts up some of Julien's newspapers, telling him the cat is responsible. She tries to be rid of it for good by deliberately setting it among the fish at the local supermarket, but the cat turns up again. After a heated argument between the couple Julien goads Clémence into ending their conflict through killing herself with an old pistol which he leaves on the dining table in their living room. Clémence takes the pistol after he leaves and after a few failed attempts, shoots the cat dead.
Julien is so distraught at losing the cat that he leaves their home for some time, staying with Nelly, his former mistress who runs the local brothel. With Nelly, he expresses some concern that his wife may drink too much. She watches for him as he comes and goes.
When Julien finally returns, he declares that he will never speak to his wife again, and they begin to communicate only by passing notes, the rift between them now grown wider. When Clémence shows him the expropriation order on their home, the last one standing in the neighbourhood, he writes "JUST AS WELL." Soon, it, too will be demolished. Clémence keeps the notes as though she hopes to find in them their lost love, to no avail. One night, while doing so, she collapses and dies. Julien returns home and is shocked to find his wife dead. Julien takes an overdose of pills and goes to bed.
The first scene, indicating cause of death as heart failure, is shown once more.