The Ponzi Scheme

A look behind the scenes at Bernie Madoff's massive Ponzi scheme, how it was perpetrated on the public and the trail of destruction it left in its wake, both for the victims and Madoff's family.

26 year-old Karl Marx embarks with his wife, Jenny, on the road to exile. In 1844 in Paris, he meets Friedrich Engels, an industrialist’s son, who has been investigating the sordid birth of the British working class. Engels, the dandy, provides the last piece of the puzzle to the young Karl Marx’s new vision of the world. Together, between censorship and the police’s repression, riots and political upheavals, they will lead the labor movement during its development into a modern era.

A criminal mastermind recruits a group of young bank employees to steal 80 million dollars in one of the largest bank heist in US history.

June, 1940. France collapses and signs the armistice. In the midst of the chaos, one man refuses to give up. Alone against the odds, this unknown general flees to London to save what remains of freedom.

In post-war France, Jan Bojarski, a young Polish refugee, became the greatest counterfeiter of all time, the "Cézanne of counterfeit money". For more than fifteen years, this man led a double life, unbeknownst to his family, making counterfeits in a garden shed that were "truer" than the bills issued by the Banque de France... All these years, this peerless counterfeiter managed to avoid being caught by the police, and became the bête noire of Commissaire Mattei in a hunt that, for these two obsessives, turned into a duel.

At the turn of the 19th century, Pugilism was the sport of kings and a gifted young boxer fought his way to becoming champion of England.

Biarritz, 1933. Charm and talent assist small-time swindler Serge Alexandre, alias Stavisky, to bribe his way into the centre of French politics. But when his great scam involving millions is exposed, he brings the government to the verge of collapse and the country to the brink of civil war.

February 1927. The funeral of Marcel Péricourt, the most powerful banker in Paris. His daughter Madeleine must take the helm of the financial empire of which she is the heiress. But she has a son, Paul, who with an unexpected and tragic gesture will place her on the path to ruin.

The tragic story of French naïve painter Séraphine Louis aka Séraphine de Senlis (1864-1942), a humble servant who becomes a gifted self-taught painter. Discovered by prominent critic and collector William Uhde, she came to prominence between the wars grouped with other naïve painters like Henri Rouseau only to descend into madness and obscurity with the onset of the Great Depression and World War II.

Rogue Trader tells the true story of Nick Leeson, an employee of Barings Bank who--after a successful trading run--ends up accumulating $1.4 billion in losses hidden in account #88888.