Hoping to make a fresh start, Léo, a jazz musician, takes up temporary residence with his friend Bony, a young writer who is struggling to get his work published. One evening, Léo strikes up an acquaintance with a woman taxi driver, Cora; in spite of her impulsive and moody temperament, he cannot help being attracted to her. On the spur of the moment, Cora invites Léo to make love to her. When Bony meets Cora, he too finds her irresistible, but he lacks Léo’s self-confidence to make his move. Cora is not a woman that any man can possess readily. She is like a wild animal, a creature that revels in its freedom. Will either Léo or Bony be able to tame her...?

At a gathering of would-be society debauchees, the Baron Plessis de Regard and the attractive young Nathalie hatch their individual plans to use sex to respectively ruin and punish their selected enemies. The Baron's plan is to scupper the political ambitions of right-wing parliamentary candidate Colonel Montvilliers by setting him up with a female companion and publicly exposing his new-found vices. Nathalie's quest is of a more personal nature, to destroy her estranged father Charles Leroy-Merville by corrupting his innocent 17-year-old daughter Sophie, a task she intends to achieve by securing employ as the girl's summer tutor.