His boss's jealousy caused Jean Morin to lose his job as a draftsman in a Nantes factory. Blacklisted by local high society, Morin lets his footsteps lead him to the countryside and finds unexpected help in Father Migaut, an old farmer who has fallen ill. Jean becomes his farmhand and then the head of his threshers, much to the dismay of the old man's sons, who don't appreciate this city boy. Finally expelled, Jean goes to seek his fortune in Paris. There, he works various odd jobs until luck smiles on him again...
Now restored in good black and white quality , with its 71 min, the film depicts the parabolic lifetime of a good man ,who becomes an outcast and works his way up ; the story is oversimplified and the final fire is decidedly the easy way out; it's a far cry from René Leprince's later masterpiece "face à l'océan "(1920);only the country fete ,where professional actors rub shoulders with local extras , predates the extraordinary sequence of the wedding in "face à l'océan" ;too few subtitles do not help.
