Like Chaplin's Modern Times, which it influenced (just as Clair's characters were influenced by Chaplin's before them), A Nous la liberté is an attack on automation which does not hesitate to compare factory life with prison life in futuristic sets designed by Lazare Meerson. The story depicts the adventures of two ex-convicts, Louis (Raymond Cody), now the owner of a large phonograph company, and Emile (Henri Marchand), a confirmed, freedom-loving vagabond. Clair combines fantasy with irony, whimsy with wistful pessimism, musical comedy with fine-tuned slapstick to create a satire of the highest order. Clair was one of the first directors to use sound selectively: in his films, spoken dialogue, incidental noises and especially music were all harnessed to create humor or suspense, and sound was often omitted entirely rather than used unnecessarily. ("There is no need to hear all of the doors bang and every character breathe, nor to hear conversation every time anyone's lips move," Clair stated.) A Nous la liberté marks the culmination of Clair's experiments in sound in two previous films, Sous les toits de Paris (Under the Roofs of Paris) and Le Million (see September 25).