After the death of his brother on the road, unemployed and unstable drifter Arthur Waldo stays for a while in the rural Australian town of Paris as the guest of the mayor, who hopes he will become a permanent member of the Paris population. Arthur soon realizes the quaint hamlet has a sinister secret: they orchestrate car accidents and rob the victims. Survivors are brought to the local hospital, lobotomized, and used for a local doctor’s experiments.

This “Traviata” became one of the most succesful of all opera films, especially in France, where 800,000 Parisian cinemagoers flocked to it in the first six week. It was nominated for two Oscars (for production and costume design) and won BAFTAs in those two categories, as well as receiving BAFTA and Golden Globe nominations as 1983’s Best Foreign-Language Film.