France in 1789 is broke, its monarchy discredited, and its people divided by widening gaps between nobility, clergy, and everyone else. The film traces the revolution from the storming of the Bastille through the fall of the monarchy to the Reign of Terror, when Maximilien Robespierre's Committee of Public Safety sent thousands to the guillotine in the name of defending the new republic. It follows the ideological currents behind the upheaval, the push for liberty, equality, and fraternity against a backdrop of famine and political discontent, and the factional infighting that turned revolutionaries against each other. Robespierre's own rise and execution serves as the film's turning point, showing how the movement's most radical phase consumed its architects. The account closes with the new governmental structures that emerged from the wreckage and the revolution's longer influence on democratic movements elsewhere. Sources for this listing are thin on specific interviews or footage used, so treat the account as a general historical overview rather than a detailed production breakdown.