Du Barry, Woman of Passion

Cosse, a private in the King's Guard, frees Jeannette Vaubernier from being stuck in a pond and is instantly charmed by her beauty and spirit. Their encounter sparks a quiet, budding romance. Jeannette shares her longing for beauty, wealth, and the possibility of being in love, despite disliking her current millinery work.

Cosse and Jeannette begin courting, drawn to each other's spirits and dreams. She expresses dislike of her millinery job but loves beauty, wealth, and the prospect of being in love, which deepens their bond. Their romance grows amid social pressures.

Jeannette is hired as an attraction at an opulent gambling house, where nobles fawn over her beauty and charm. Her rising charisma earns the admiration of high-ranking noblemen, and King Louis XV takes notice. Cosse disapproves of her job but the bond between them remains tested.

Cosse, despite his misgivings about Jeannette's new life, proposes marriage in the hopes of formalizing their bond. She accepts, setting the stage for a future that might bridge their worlds. The couple is soon drawn toward a more complicated relationship with the royal court.

The King meets Jeannette while disguised as a messenger in the gambling house and openly declares his love, offering her the position of his favorite mistress. Cosse overhears the exchange and, believing she has accepted, angrily breaks off the engagement.

The King removes his disguise and takes Jeannette as his mistress, and she moves into the palace. Count Du Barry presses for a title, even offering to buy an exiled brother's title, but Jeannette refuses while becoming known as Countess Du Barry. She spends lavishly, though the King knows she still loves Cosse and urges her to forget him.

Jeannette asks the Duc de Brissac about Cosse; he reveals Cosse is likely alive but whereabouts are unknown, and that there is growing hunger in France. He also notes that commoners hate Jeannette for living in aristocratic luxury and claims Cosse's last words to him expressed hate toward her.

Distraught, Jeannette decides to shed her jewels to ease guilt and distance herself from excess. Meanwhile, the King's advisers urge him to repeal the Pacte de Famine to curb the rebellion, but the King refuses. The Duc remains fixated on Cosse's supposed fate and the widening rift between the crown and the people.

The Duc de Brissac reveals that Cosse is alive and has become the leader of the rebellion, shocking the King who imprisoned him months earlier. This deception fuels the growing conflict between the crown and the people. Jeannette's sympathies are increasingly divided between love and loyalty to Cosse.

A wounded Cosse enters Jeannette's room as soldiers search the palace, and she hides him in her bed. He explains his rebel motives and the injustice of his imprisonment. The Duc discovers Cosse, heightening the danger for Jeannette and the crown.

The King hosts a grand party with a plan to publicly execute Cosse. He claims that the Duc killed himself after handing over his son. Jeannette declares her loyalty and love in a bid to save Cosse, but the pretense breaks under strain as Cosse prepares to face execution.

In the chaos, Jeannette opens the palace gates to let in the angry mob, providing cover for Cosse to escape. The crowd disrupts the execution, and Cosse slips away into the turmoil. The event marks a temporary reprieve from the crown's control.

During the French Revolution, Jeannette is imprisoned due to her connection to the ancien régime. She is condemned to death and clings to the hope that Cosse will fetch her, but he cannot overturn her sentence. The fall of the monarchy seals her fate alongside the man she loves.

Cosse renounces his loyalty to the French Republic so that he and Jeannette may be executed together. This sacrifice underscores the depth of his devotion as the Republic moves to sentencing them. Their fates become tied in a final act of shared ruin.