The Lower Depths

“From the world-famous play by MAXIM GORKI”

Pepel Wasska (Jean Gabin) is a young thief who wants out of the flophouse where he sleeps, out from under the landlord Kostyleva, and clear of the landlord's wife, Vassilissa (Suzy Prim). Jean Renoir fills the place with fallen people, among them a former nobleman (Louis Jouvet) who becomes Pepel's friend. The film sets the comfort of the rich beside the cold of the poor and finds that the poor are the ones who laugh.