AllMovie

Set during the French restoration in the 1830s, this conventional, verbose costume drama features Jean-Claude Pascal as Philippe, a young officer under Napoleon Bonaparte whose career during the Restoration is anything but smooth. He has an ill-advised romance with the wrong woman that prods his dormant ambition and makes him climb to the top of the social ladder. Unfortunately, society is as corrupt as usual and his gradual climb up the ladder does not mean that the descent down is going to be equally slow paced.