Habib Benglia

The film is a 20th-century adaptation of Voltaire's 1759 social satire novel Candide, ou l’Optimisme.

A Dutch slave captain, on a voyage to Cuba, faces a revolt fomented by a newly captured African slave, Tamango. The slaves capture the captain's mistress, forcing a showdown.

A team of doctors sets out through a steamy African jungle to check an outbreak of sleeping sickness.

A little Métis girl, Kalina is saved from a massacre by Taraor, a black man from Sudan. Having become a great and beautiful dancer from the South, she meets Captain Portal, in garrison in Marrakech. This is the beginning of a great love story. But that's counting without Taraor's jealousy.

At sea, sailors have got to make do with what they have. François is in love with.... the figurehead, the bust of a gorgeous woman.

Conchita married the caïd Tahamar who deceives her about her “race”. She had to leave her love, Jean Costa, who is a prisoner of Tahamar. She decides to flee with Jean.

Hervé is a tough sea captain in command of the "Duchesse Anne", a rum-trading ship. But the sea dog hides a tender heart and he allows Marie-Douce, a poor slum girl who dreams of seeing the wide world,on board. To have her accepted by the crew, he passes her off as his niece. A seasoned master like him, wise enough to ban alcohol use on his ship, should have known better : a beautiful girl on the deck cannot but unleash the savage instincts of all those men without women.

Nathalie falls for Baptiste Debureau, a mime. But his heart is set on Garance, who is also coveted by Frederick Lemaitre and the Count of Montray.

During a French construction project in the Sudan, a military doctor fights against leprosy and the natives seek protection against witch doctors.

In the village of Sableuse, the local manor has been bought out by a nouveau riche, Emile Cousinet. When his wife Lisette, a former music hall actress, flees to Paris with young Pierre de Sableuse, Cousinet asks Father Pellegrin, the village vicar, to bring the lost sheep back home.

An adventurer tries to seize oil deposits in Mongolia .

Captain Justin Mollenard works for a company that sells armaments to the Far East. After an eventful stay in Shanghai, where he and his cargo are the victim of a malicious attack, he returns to his hometown of Dunkirk. Mollenard receives a frosty welcome from his wife Mathilde, who resents the way in which he has neglected his family for so many years. Mollenard’s only wish is to get back to sea as soon as he can, but a sudden heart-attack leaves him paralysed and entirely in his wife’s power...

Said Ali, an old and sick noble Arab, living on an island in the Red Sea, has no other occupation than collecting pearls. The spiteful Nadir tries to take possession of the treasure, he kills Said Aly but finds a terrible death by desecrating his tomb.

A group of French soldiers, including the patrician Captain de Boeldieu and the working-class Lieutenant Maréchal, grapple with their own class differences after being captured and held in a World War I German prison camp. When the men are transferred to a high-security fortress, they must concoct a plan to escape beneath the watchful eye of aristocratic German officer von Rauffenstein, who has formed an unexpected bond with de Boeldieu.

A commander suspects his wife of infidelity, when she turns to a subordinate officer to help her against someone threatening to blackmail her about her troubled past.

Whoever brings the Countess back her stolen necklace will receive a bonus of ten thousand francs. Honoré, the vagabond, who involuntarily finds himself in possession of the jewel, offers it to a little peasant girl who had been charitable towards him and with a touch of melancholy, resumes his journey.

The spahi Jean Peyral is very in love with the flirtatious Cora. When he realizes that she betrays him, he tries to kill himself. He is saved by the tenderness of a young native, Fatou.

Towards the end of the 19th century, the Duke of Gerolstein traveled to Paris. Sixteen years earlier he had a daughter who was taken from him by her mother who was chased out of the palace. After many dramatic adventures, the Duke finds his daughter in the person of Fleur de Marie, martyred throughout her childhood by the Owl and the schoolmaster.

Shades of Othello loom in this engrossing exploration of class, race, and murder set on an ocean liner. Young Dainah encounters an engineer onboard who mistakes pleasantries for flirtation. When she disappears the next day, suspicion spreads not only to the engineer but also to Dainah's husband.

"Tu seras duchesse!" ("You'll Be a Duchess!") With these words, self-made industrialist Poisson orders his daughter Lucie to marry a wealthy Duke. The duke's father objects to the union, whereupon Poisson arranges another marriage for his daughter, this time to an impoverished and sickly young marquis. Poisson's strategy runs something like this: the Marquis is expected to die soon, whereupon the widowed Lucie will become a marquess, and thus a worthy bride for the Duke. But the Marquis foils these plans by staging a miraculous recovery. The explanation? The Marquis and Lucie have been in love all along, and this was the only way that they could wed with Poisson's blessing. Darned clever, these Frenchmen!.

In 1318, in Morocco, a bandit kidnapped the marabout's daughter as a hostage, demanding that the gates of the city be opened to her. The boss, fiance of the young girl, learns that she is safe and sound and organizes the resistance. He puts the bandit and his band to flight and brings back the young girl.

A prominent chanteuse on a world tour meets a young fellow European in Singapore, a soldier of fortune who becomes obsessed with listening to her voice on a recording.

Yasmina, a rich Tunisian Princess, daughter of a French lady and a Muslim gentleman, is betrothed by a father to a rich fifty year old man named Afsen. She reluctantly accept the marriage but soon becomes ill from boredom and she falls in love with the French doctor called from Tunis to take care of her, Hector Grandier, who also happens to be a childhood friend. Her husband finds out and Yasmina sticks a knife in her own bosom in a middle of a fight. The Princess's maid, Athima, accuses the old husband of attempting to kill the girl and he is sentenced to death. Hector rescues him from his fate and the two lovers are free to love each other in the eyes of the law.