Immediately after Lisa (Loren) declares that she is leaving her immature, abusive, but easy-going husband Robert (Perkins), he is reported dead in a plane crash. Secretly still alive, he convinces…

An adaptation of Émile Zola’s 1877 masterpiece L’assommoir, the film is an uncompromising depiction of a lowly laundress’s struggles to deal with an alcoholic husband while running her own business.