In wartime France, pharmacist Eliane begins an affair with her shop assistant Armand, but she soon becomes dominated by him. He demands more and more from her, humiliating her and putting her family at risk.

On a 1940 France, just before the great invasion, Eliane is a pharmacist who is married to a dull professor, Henri and has a teenage daughter, Justine. She is an attractive woman but has let her passion fall dormant. One evening, the pharmacy clerk Armand makes a pass at her when he thinks she is Juliette, another employee. Soon she lets the passion overtake her and she begins an affair with him. But he soon starts making ever-growing demands to her, forcing her to have sex under the pharmacy counter and undress in front of a female employee of the pharmacy (who is also having an affair with him), among others demands, effectively turning her into his sex slave. When she finally let herself admit her submission to him, he demands her teenage daughter to prove she'd do anything for him.

France, 1939. In a small provincial town, the intellectual lover of poetry, Henri, and his unhappy wife, Eliane, run the local drug store. Unsatisfied and on the brink of divorcing her neglectful husband, beautiful Eliane embarks on a torrid affair with the pharmacy clerk, Armand, only to find herself trapped in a world of obsession, lies, and humiliation. Now, Armand wants to break helpless Eliane's will, submitting her in unspeakable acts of emotional terror. Will Eliane ever restore her lost dignity?—Nick Riganas