Joseph Dupuche and his wife Germaine travel to South America, where Joseph is supposed to work for a French company. Freshly married and full of excitement for exotic adventures, they make plans for the future. The harsh reality hits them hard. In Panama, it turns out that the company has gone bankrupt. Without money and work, they find themselves with nothing. The struggle for survival drives the couple apart and reveals how fragile their relationship is. While Germaine desperately tries to prevent their social decline, Joseph begins to drink and, to the shock of the French community, moves in with the young Black woman Véronique to the other side of the canal, into the so-called Quartier nègre. What was once an exotic paradise reveals itself to be hell. A journey into the dark depths of humanity.