A Woman of Paris Synopsis

Marie St. Clair lives with her tyrannical father in a French village. She escapes for the evening to meet her boyfriend Jean Millet, but on their return she is forbidden to re-enter the house. Nor will Jean’s father allow her to remain in his house. Marie and Jean decide to elope to Paris. Jean, however, is prevented from arriving for the rendez-vous at the station by the sudden death of his father from a stroke. Marie supposes that Jean has abandoned her, and sets off for Paris alone …

A year later Marie St. Clair is the glittering but disenchanted mistress of a rich man-about-town, Pierre Revel. By chance she meets Jean, who has come to Paris with his mother and is now a struggling artist. Marie commissions him to paint her portrait. They fall in love once again, and Jean proposes marriage.

Marie decides to leave Pierre but then overhears the weak-willed Jean reassuring his possessive mother that his proposal of marriage is not serious.

Marie returns to Pierre, and refuses to see the remorseful Jean. Distraught at losing Marie again, he shoots himself. His mother sets out with his gun to avenge herself on Marie, but is touched when she finds the disconsolate girl weeping over the body of Jean. The two women are reconciled.

Later, Marie and the mother of Jean have together found redemption and consolation in the service of others – raising orphans in a country home. In the final shot Marie is cheerfully riding with her charges on the back of a hay cart. A limousine flashes by. Inside it is Pierre Revel. His secretary asks him, “By the way, whatever became of Marie St. Clair ?” Pierre shrugs with indifference.