Chabrol's first two films, Le Beau Serge and Les Cousins, were his ironic renditions of the city mouse and the country mouse. Whereas in Les Cousins the country cousin visits the city and urban decadence is seen in an alien light, Le Beau Serge tells of a young Parisian whose return to his native village distills for him an essential poverty in rural relationships. François (Jean-Claude Brialy) returns home to discover that his friend and idol, the talented future architect Serge (Gérard Blain), has become a drunkard, wallowing in despair and guilt following the stillbirth of a child. François naively attempts to intervene in his friend's apathy. Surprisingly little known, Le Beau Serge remains one of Chabrol's best films, rich in details of life in a modern-day peasant milieu, served up by a director for whom, as James Monaco wrote, “mise-en-scène almost always takes precedence over psychology.”